c# - How to stop self-referencing loop in .Net Core Web API?

Question

I'm having some issues which I'm guessing are related to self-referencing using .NET Core Web API and Entity Framework Core. My Web API starting choking when I added .Includes for some navigation properties.

I found what appears to be a solution in the older Web API but I don't know how to implement the same thing for .NET Core Web API (I'm still in the early learning stages).

The older solution was sticking this in the Application_Start() of the Global.asax:

 GlobalConfiguration.Configuration.Formatters.JsonFormatter.SerializerSettings.ReferenceLoopHandling = ReferenceLoopHandling.Serialize;

I suspect this is handled in the StartUp's ConfigureService() method but I don't know much beyond there.

Or is there a more appropriate way to handle this issue?

Answer 1

Okay... I finally found some reference material on this. The solution is:

public void ConfigureServices(IServiceCollection services)
{
    ...

    services.AddMvc()
        .AddJsonOptions(
            options => options.SerializerSettings.ReferenceLoopHandling = Newtonsoft.Json.ReferenceLoopHandling.Ignore
        );

    ...
}

I got this from here