PortfolioOrleans

A .NET 10 ASP.NET Core Web API demonstrating Microsoft Orleans, a virtual actor framework for building distributed applications.

Overview

Orleans provides a straightforward approach to building distributed systems by using the virtual actor model. Actors (called grains) are automatically instantiated, placed, and managed by the Orleans runtime. This project implements a URL shortener to showcase grains, silos, persistent state, and grain factories.

Key concepts:

• Grains: The core building blocks. Each grain has a unique identity and can hold state. Grains communicate via async method calls.
• Silos: Host processes that store and manage grains. A cluster is a group of silos that coordinate work.
• Grain Factory: Used to obtain references to grains by their identity.

Project Structure

PortfolioOrleans/
├── PortfolioOrleans.sln
├── src/
│   └── PortfolioOrleans/
│       ├── Controllers/
│       │   └── UrlShortenerController.cs
│       ├── Grains/
│       │   ├── IUrlShortenerGrain.cs
│       │   └── UrlShortenerGrain.cs
│       ├── Models/
│       │   └── UrlDetails.cs
│       └── Program.cs
└── tests/
    └── PortfolioOrleans.Tests/
        ├── ClusterFixture.cs
        └── Grains/
            └── UrlShortenerGrainTests.cs

Requirements

• .NET 10 SDK

Commands

# Build (solution or project)
dotnet build
# or: dotnet build PortfolioOrleans.sln

# Run
dotnet run --project src/PortfolioOrleans/PortfolioOrleans.csproj

# Test
dotnet test

Sample Usage

Once the app is running (default: http://localhost:5000 or https://localhost:5001):

Shorten a URL:

curl "http://localhost:5000/shorten?url=https://learn.microsoft.com"

Redirect using shortened URL:

curl -L "http://localhost:5000/go/ABC123"

Home:

curl http://localhost:5000/

Endpoints

Endpoint	Description
GET /	Welcome message
GET /shorten?url={url}	Creates a shortened URL, returns the new URL
GET /go/{shortenedRouteSegment}	Redirects to the original URL