HttpClient and you

Coding Corner C# Tips
1

In your C# journey, you may require the use of HttpClient. You may find examples that have you put HttpClient in a using statement. It’s been said that this is not proper practice.

Sources

Summary

Using HttpClient within a using() statement is not recommended due to the potential for socket exhaustion and performance degradation caused by frequent creation and disposal of TCP connections. Each HttpClient instance manages its own connection pool, and creating a new instance for each request can lead to inefficient resource usage. Instead, reusing HttpClient instances across multiple requests within the lifetime of the application or a specific component is advised to minimize overhead and improve performance. By managing HttpClient instances properly and reusing them as needed, developers can avoid issues associated with excessive resource allocation and ensure optimal utilization of network resources.

Example 1

The following is an example of a reusable HttpClient. This C# example will check the broadcaster’s Twitch account age using the decapi API and return it as %accountAge%:

using System;
using System.Threading.Tasks;
using System.Net.Http;
using System.Net.Http.Headers;
using Newtonsoft.Json;
using Newtonsoft.Json.Linq;

public class CPHInline
{
    private static readonly HttpClient _httpClient = new HttpClient{Timeout = TimeSpan.FromSeconds(30)};

    public void Init()
    {
        _httpClient.DefaultRequestHeaders.Clear(); // Optionally clear headers if needed
    }

    public void Dispose()
    {
        _httpClient?.Dispose();
    }

    public bool Execute()
    {
        // Get broadcaster info
        TwitchUserInfo broadcastInfo = CPH.TwitchGetBroadcaster();
        string username = broadcastInfo.UserLogin;

        // Specify the URL you want to send the GET request to
        string apiUrl = $"https://decapi.me/twitch/accountage/{username}";

        string jsonResponse = GetRequestAsync(apiUrl).GetAwaiter().GetResult();

        if (string.IsNullOrEmpty(jsonResponse))
        {
            CPH.LogError("jsonResponse returned null");
            return false;
        }
        else
        {
            CPH.LogDebug($"Account age: '{jsonResponse}'");
            CPH.SetArgument("accountAge", jsonResponse);
            return true;
        }
    }

    private async Task<string> GetRequestAsync(string apiUrl)
    {
        try
        {
            // Send the GET request and get the response
            HttpResponseMessage response = await _httpClient.GetAsync(apiUrl);

            // Check if the request was successful
            if (!response.IsSuccessStatusCode)
            {
                // If the request was not successful, log the error
                CPH.LogError($"{response.StatusCode} - {response.ReasonPhrase}");
                return null;
            }

            // Read and print the content of the response
            string content = await response.Content.ReadAsStringAsync();
            return content;
        }
        catch (Exception ex)
        {
            // Handle exceptions specific to the asynchronous operation
            CPH.LogError(ex.Message);
            return null;
        }
    }
}

Example 2

I’ve attached an import code providing a full working example. This example will check if the broadcaster is currently live on Twitch and return the variable %isLive% as either True or False
httpClientExample.sb (3.9 KB)

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