WCF Service , how to increase the timeout?

Question

Might seem like a silly question, but everything in WCF seems a lot more complicated than in asmx, how can I increase the timeout of an svc service?

Here is what I have so far:

<bindings>
      <basicHttpBinding>
        <binding name="IncreasedTimeout" 
          openTimeout="12:00:00" 
          receiveTimeout="12:00:00" closeTimeout="12:00:00"
          sendTimeout="12:00:00">
        </binding>
      </basicHttpBinding>
</bindings>

And then my endpoint gets mapped like this:

<endpoint address="" 
  binding="basicHttpBinding" bindingConfiguration="IncreasedTimeout"
             contract="ServiceLibrary.IDownloads">
             <identity>
                <dns value="localhost" />
             </identity>
          </endpoint>

The exact error I am getting:

The request channel timed out while waiting for a reply after 00:00:59.9990000. Increase the timeout value passed to the call to Request or increase the SendTimeout value on the Binding. The time allotted to this operation may have been a portion of a longer timeout.

In the WCF Test Client, there is a config icon that contains the run time configuration of my service:

As you can see its not the same values as I've set for it? What am I doing wrong?

<bindings>
            <basicHttpBinding>
                <binding name="BasicHttpBinding_IDownloads" closeTimeout="00:01:00"
                    openTimeout="00:01:00" receiveTimeout="00:10:00" sendTimeout="00:01:00"
                    allowCookies="false" bypassProxyOnLocal="false" hostNameComparisonMode="StrongWildcard"
                    maxBufferSize="65536" maxBufferPoolSize="524288" maxReceivedMessageSize="65536"
                    messageEncoding="Text" textEncoding="utf-8" transferMode="Buffered"
                    useDefaultWebProxy="true">
                    <readerQuotas maxDepth="32" maxStringContentLength="8192" maxArrayLength="16384"
                        maxBytesPerRead="4096" maxNameTableCharCount="16384" />
                    <security mode="None">
                        <transport clientCredentialType="None" proxyCredentialType="None"
                            realm="">
                            <extendedProtectionPolicy policyEnforcement="Never" />
                        </transport>
                        <message clientCredentialType="UserName" algorithmSuite="Default" />
                    </security>
                </binding>
            </basicHttpBinding>
        </bindings>

Retinoscope

Answer 1

The timeout configuration needs to be set at the client level, so the configuration I was setting in the web.config had no effect, the WCF test tool has its own configuration and there is where you need to set the timeout.

Retinoscope

well, yes - typically, it has to be set both on the client and the server, even - e.g. in case of "inactivityTimeout" on sessions and things like that. – Nowhither

JL: can you show what exaclty you have done? i am having the same issue – Encage

If your using the 'WCF Test Client', right click on 'Config File' in the service tree, then click 'Edit with SvcConfigEditor' and change the timeout within the bindings. – Gautious

Answer 2

In your binding configuration, there are four timeout values you can tweak:

<bindings>
  <basicHttpBinding>
    <binding name="IncreasedTimeout"
             sendTimeout="00:25:00">
    </binding>
  </basicHttpBinding>

The most important is the sendTimeout, which says how long the client will wait for a response from your WCF service. You can specify hours:minutes:seconds in your settings - in my sample, I set the timeout to 25 minutes.

The openTimeout as the name implies is the amount of time you're willing to wait when you open the connection to your WCF service. Similarly, the closeTimeout is the amount of time when you close the connection (dispose the client proxy) that you'll wait before an exception is thrown.

The receiveTimeout is a bit like a mirror for the sendTimeout - while the send timeout is the amount of time you'll wait for a response from the server, the receiveTimeout is the amount of time you'll give you client to receive and process the response from the server.

In case you're send back and forth "normal" messages, both can be pretty short - especially the receiveTimeout, since receiving a SOAP message, decrypting, checking and deserializing it should take almost no time. The story is different with streaming - in that case, you might need more time on the client to actually complete the "download" of the stream you get back from the server.

There's also openTimeout, receiveTimeout, and closeTimeout. The MSDN docs on binding gives you more information on what these are for.

To get a serious grip on all the intricasies of WCF, I would strongly recommend you purchase the "Learning WCF" book by Michele Leroux Bustamante:

Learning WCF http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51GNuqUJq%2BL._BO2,204,203,200_PIsitb-sticker-arrow-click,TopRight,35,-76_AA240_SH20_OU01_.jpg

and you also spend some time watching her 15-part "WCF Top to Bottom" screencast series - highly recommended!

For more advanced topics I recommend that you check out Juwal Lowy's Programming WCF Services book.

Programming WCF http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41odWcLoGAL._BO2,204,203,200_PIsitb-sticker-arrow-click,TopRight,35,-76_AA240_SH20_OU01_.jpg

Nowhither

I've tried to add the binding sections to <system.serviceModel> in web.config, but its throwing an error now.... any additional steps I've missed out on... – Retinoscope

I also changed the endpoint in my service to the <endpoint address="" binding="IncreasedTimeout" - is this the wrong thing to do? – Retinoscope

I think I get it - binding="basicHttpBinding" bindingConfiguration="IncreasedTimeout" – Retinoscope

exactly - the binding is the type of protocol you use - basicHttp, wsHttp, netTcp. The binding configuration is this configuration you create in config to modify timeouts etc. – Nowhither

Funny even after doing this, still getting a timeout error, Marc can you please give as much information as possible? – Retinoscope

Tried to add more info - what exception exactly are you getting? Can you post the exception message and a possible InnerException (if there's one)? – Nowhither

I think the description of receiveTimeout is incorrect. msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh924831(v=vs.110).aspx: "how long a session can be idle before timing out" msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/… "This specifies, for example, the maximum time a client may take to send at least one message to the server before the server will close the channel used by a session. This behavior ensures that clients cannot hold on to server resources for arbitrary long periods." – Carnal

Suppose I send only one message with client-side OperationTimeout of 5 minutes, the server-side has Thread.Sleep(TimeSpan.FromMinutes(4)) and the server-side ReceiveTimeout is 1 minute. Even though the service is still processing a message and the client is not receiving any response yet, I still hit the 1 minute timeout and my connection drops. I can change ReceiveTimeout to 2 minutes and see the connection drop 2 minutes later. – Carnal

I should clarify I'm seeing the above with named pipes. I suspect TCP works the same way, while HTTP may work differently. Either way, the documentation seems to suggest it's an idle timeout or the time that the service doesn't receive any requests from the client, not how long the client takes to process a response from the server. I could see how a synchronous workload with a short-running server operation and a long-running client operation before the next message is sent, ReceiveTimeout would start approaching what you said. – Carnal

Answer 3

The best way is to change any setting you want in your code.

Check out the below example:

using(WCFServiceClient client = new WCFServiceClient ())
{ 
    client.Endpoint.Binding.SendTimeout = new TimeSpan(0, 1, 30);
}

Cyaneous

this is a better solution rather updating the config so I can configure a different value for different calls and services, many thanks – Kickapoo

Answer 4

Got the same error recently but was able to fixed it by ensuring to close every wcf client call. eg.

WCFServiceClient client = new WCFServiceClient ();
//More codes here
// Always close the client.
client.Close();

or

using(WCFServiceClient client = new WCFServiceClient ())
{ 
    //More codes here 
}

Carrasco

Don't use the 'using' approach: omaralzabir.com/do-not-use-using-in-wcf-client – Loraine

In the comments of omaralzabir.com/do-not-use-using-in-wcf-client, there are examples of how to still use using while not disposing a faulted channel object. Here is another blogger with an approach more compatible with using blocks: erwyn.bloggingabout.net/2006/12/09/WCF-Service-Proxy-Helper. – Viator

Answer 5

public static WebHttpBinding GetBinding()
{
    var binding = new WebHttpBinding
    {
        ReceiveTimeout = TimeSpan.MaxValue,
        SendTimeout = TimeSpan.MaxValue,

        MaxBufferPoolSize = int.MaxValue,
        MaxReceivedMessageSize = int.MaxValue,
        Security =
            {
                Mode = WebHttpSecurityMode.None,   
                Transport = {ClientCredentialType = HttpClientCredentialType.None}
            },
        //ProxyAddress = new Uri("", UriKind.Absolute),
        UseDefaultWebProxy = false
    };
    return binding;
}

Hysteroid

ReceiveTimeout = TimeSpan.MaxValue, SendTimeout = TimeSpan.MaxValue, – Hysteroid

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