Understanding the Architecture of .NET Core

As you embark on your journey of learning .NET Core, understanding its architecture is a crucial part of mastering this powerful framework. In this article, we’ll break down the architecture of .NET Core, making it easy for you to understand its different components and how they interact with each other.

1. Introduction to .NET Core
2. The .NET Core Architecture
3. The Base Class Library (BCL)
4. The Common Language Runtime (CLR)
5. ASP.NET Core
6. Entity Framework Core

.NET Core is an open-source, cross-platform framework developed by Microsoft that allows you to develop a wide range of applications. Whether you’re into web development, building microservices, or creating desktop applications, .NET Core offers a robust and versatile platform for your development needs.

.NET Core’s architecture is modular, layered, and follows a design that allows high level of performance and scalability. Its architecture comprises two main components:

• The Base Class Library (BCL)
• The Common Language Runtime (CLR)

Let’s delve into each of these components.

The Base Class Library (BCL) is a comprehensive collection of reusable classes, interfaces, and value types that provide access to system functionality. These libraries are the fundamental building blocks of a .NET Core application and provide functionalities for tasks like string handling, file I/O, collections, data access, and more.

You can use these libraries in your code like this:

string message = "Hello, .NET Core!";
Console.WriteLine(message);

In this code snippet, Console is a class from the BCL.

The Common Language Runtime (CLR) is the heart of the .NET Core platform. It’s responsible for managing the execution of .NET programs and provides important services like memory management, thread management, garbage collection, exception handling, and more.

While the CLR operates behind the scenes, it’s useful to know its role in executing your .NET Core applications.

ASP.NET Core is a part of the .NET Core framework designed for building web applications. It is lightweight, modular, and can be used to build anything from small, single-page web apps to large, enterprise-level web applications.

ASP.NET Core operates on the middleware concept where you can compose your application’s request pipeline using components. Here is a basic example of setting up middleware in the Startup.cs file of an ASP.NET Core app:

public void Configure(IApplicationBuilder app, IWebHostEnvironment env)
{
    if (env.IsDevelopment())
    {
        app.UseDeveloperExceptionPage();
    }
    else
    {
        app.UseExceptionHandler("/Home/Error");
    }

    app.UseStaticFiles();

    app.UseRouting();

    app.UseAuthorization();

    app.UseEndpoints(endpoints =>
    {
        endpoints.MapControllerRoute(
            name: "default",
            pattern: "{controller=Home}/{action=Index}/{id?}");
    });
}

Entity Framework Core (EF Core) is a lightweight, extensible, and open-source version of the popular Entity Framework data access technology.

EF Core serves as an object-relational mapper (ORM), enabling .NET developers to work with a database using .NET objects, and eliminating the need for most of the data-access code they

usually need to write.

Here’s a simple code snippet showing how you can query data using EF Core:

using (var context = new BloggingContext())
{
    var blogs = context.Blogs
        .Where(b => b.Rating > 3)
        .ToList();
}

By understanding the architecture of .NET Core, you can utilize the framework more effectively and develop applications that are more efficient, scalable, and maintainable. So whether you are embarking on web development training or diving deeper into learning ASP.NET Core or using Entity Framework Core, knowing the architecture will aid you greatly in your journey.