Parse SDK for .NET

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A library that gives you access to the powerful Parse Server backend from any platform supporting .NET Standard 2.0. For more information about Parse and its features, visit parseplatform.org.

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• Parse SDK for .NET
  • Getting Started
  • Using the Code
    • Common Definitions
    • Client-Side Use
    • Use In Unity Client
      • Unity3D on iOS
      • Unity3D on Android
    • Server-Side Use
    • Basic Demonstration
  • Local Builds
  • .NET Core CLI

Getting Started

The previous stable release version 1.7.0 is available as [a NuGet package][nuget-link].

The latest development release is also available as [a NuGet package (Prerelease)][nuget-link-prerelease].

Note that the previous stable package currently available on the official distribution channel is quite old. To use the most up-to-date code, either build this project and reference the generated NuGet package, download the pre-built assembly from [releases][releases-link] or check the [NuGet package (Prerelease)][nuget-link-prerelease] on NuGet.

Using the Code

Make sure you are using the project's root namespace.

using Parse;

The ParseClient class has three constructors, one allowing you to specify your Application ID, Server URI, and .NET Key as well as some configuration items, one for creating clones of ParseClient.Instance if Publicize was called on an instance previously, and another, accepting an IServerConnectionData implementation instance which exposes the data needed for the SDK to connect to a Parse Server instance, like the first constructor, but with a few extra options. You can create your own IServerConnectionData implementation or use the ServerConnectionData struct. IServerConnectionData allows you to expose a value the SDK should use as the master key, as well as some extra request headers if needed.

ParseClient client = new ParseClient("Your Application ID", "The Parse Server Instance Host URI", "Your .NET Key");

ParseClient client = new ParseClient(new ServerConnectionData
{
    ApplicationID = "Your Application ID",
    ServerURI = "The Parse Server Instance Host URI",
    Key = "Your .NET Key", // This is unnecessary if a value for MasterKey is specified.
    MasterKey = "Your Master Key",
    Headers = new Dictionary<string, string>
    {
        ["X-Extra-Header"] = "Some Value"
    }
});

ServerConnectionData is available in the Parse.Infrastructure namespace.

The two non-cloning ParseClient constructors contain optional parameters for an IServiceHub implementation instance and an array of IServiceHubMutators. These should only be used when the behaviour of the SDK needs to be changed such as when it is used with the Unity game engine.

To find full usage instructions for the latest stable release, please visit the [Parse docs website][parse-docs-link]. Please note that the latest stable release is quite old and does not reflect the work being done at the moment.

Common Definitions

• Application ID: Your app's ApplicationId field from your Parse Server.
• Key: Your app's .NET Key field from your Parse Server.
• Master Key: Your app's Master Key field from your Parse Server. Using this key with the SDK will allow it to bypass any CLPs and object permissions that are set. This also should be compatible with read-only master keys as well.
• Server URI: The full URL to your web-hosted Parse Server.

Client-Side Use

In your program's entry point, instantiate a ParseClient with all the parameters needed to connect to your target Parse Server instance, then call Publicize on it. This will light up the static ParseClient.Instance property with the newly-instantiated ParseClient, so you can perform operations with the SDK.

new ParseClient(/* Parameters */).Publicize();

Use In Unity Client

In Unity, the same logic applies to use the SDK as in any other client, except that a special IServiceHub impelementation instance, a MetadataMutator, and an AbsoluteCacheLocationMutator need to be passed in to one of the non-cloning ParseClient constructors in order to specify the environment and platform metadata, as well as the absolute cache location manually. This step is needed because the logic that creates these values automatically will fail and create incorrect values. The functionality to do this automatically may eventually be provided as a Unity package in the future, but for now, the following code can be used.

using System;
using UnityEngine;
using Parse.Infrastructure;

new ParseClient(/* Parameters */,
    new LateInitializedMutableServiceHub { },
    new MetadataMutator
    {
        EnvironmentData = new EnvironmentData { OSVersion = SystemInfo.operatingSystem, Platform = $"Unity {Application.unityVersion} on {SystemInfo.operatingSystemFamily}", TimeZone = TimeZoneInfo.Local.StandardName },
        HostManifestData = new HostManifestData { Name = Application.productName, Identifier = Application.productName, ShortVersion = Application.version, Version = Application.version }
    },
    new AbsoluteCacheLocationMutator
    {
        CustomAbsoluteCacheFilePath = $"{Application.persistentDataPath.Replace('/', Path.DirectorySeparatorChar)}{Path.DirectorySeparatorChar}Parse.cache"
    }
    ).Publicize();

Other IServiceHubMutator implementations are available that do different things, such as the RelativeCacheLocationMutator, which allows a custom cache location relative to the default base folder (System.Environment.SpecialFolder.LocalApplicationData) to be specified.

If you are having trouble getting the SDK to work on other platforms, try to use the above code to control what values for various metadata information items the SDK will use, to see if that fixes the issue.

Unity3D on iOS

When using the Parse SDK on iOS/iPadOS target platforms you may encounter issues during runtime where the creation of ParseObjects using subclassing or other Parse methods fail. This occurs due to the fact that Unity strips code from the project and it will most likely do so for some parts of the Parse.dll assembly file.

To prevent Unity to remove necessary code from the assembly it is necessary to include a link.xml file in your project which tells Unity to not touch anything from the Parse.dll.

<linker>
  <assembly fullname="Parse" preserve="all"/>
</linker>

Save the above xml code to a file called 'link.xml' and place it in the Assets folder of your project.

Unity3D on Android

When using the Parse SDK on Android target platform you may encounter an issue related to network communication and resolution of host addresses when using the Parse SDK. This occurs in situations where you might use the Parse SDK but did not configure your Android app to require internet access. Whenever a project does not explicitly state it requires internet access Unity will try to remove classes and system assemblies during the build process, causing Parse-calls to fail with different exceptions. This may not be the case if your project uses any Unity specific web/networking code, as this will be detected by the engine and the code stripping will not be done.

To set your project, navigate to Project Settings -> Player -> Other Settings -> Internet Access and switch it to Require. Depending on the version of Unity you are using this setting may be found in a slightly different location or with slightly different naming, use the above path as a guidance.

Server-Side Use

The SDK can be set up in a way such that every new ParseClient instance can authenticate a different user concurrently. This is enabled by an IServiceHubMutator implementation which adds itself as an IServiceHubCloner implementation to the service hub which, making it so that consecutive calls to the cloning ParseClient constructor (the one without parameters) will clone the publicized ParseClient instance, exposed by ParseClient.Instance, replacing the IParseCurrentUserController implementation instance with a fresh one with no caching every time. This allows you to configure the original instance, and have the clones retain the general behaviour, while also allowing the differnt users to be signed into the their respective clones and execute requests concurrently, without causing race conditions. To use this feature of the SDK, the first ParseClient instance must be constructued and publicized as follows once, before any other ParseClient instantiations. Any classes that need to be registered must be done so with the original instance.

new ParseClient(/* Parameters */, default, new ConcurrentUserServiceHubCloner { }).Publicize();

Consecutive instantiations can be done via the cloning constructor for simplicity's sake.

ParseClient client = new ParseClient { };

Basic Demonstration

The following code shows how to use the Parse .NET SDK to create a new user, save and authenticate the user, deauthenticate the user, re-authenticate the user, create an object with permissions that allow only the user to modify it, save the object, update the object, delete the object, and deauthenticate the user once more.

// Instantiate a ParseClient.
ParseClient client = new ParseClient(/* Parameters */);

// Create a user, save it, and authenticate with it.
await client.SignUpAsync(username: "Test", password: "Test");

// Get the authenticated user. This is can also be done with a variable that stores the ParseUser instance before the SignUp overload that accepts a ParseUser is called.
Console.WriteLine(client.GetCurrentUser().SessionToken);

// Deauthenticate the user.
await client.LogOutAsync();

// Authenticate the user.
ParseUser user = await client.LogInAsync(username: "Test", password: "Test");

// Create a new object with permessions that allow only the user to modify it.
ParseObject testObject = new ParseObject("TestClass") { ACL = new ParseACL(user) };

// Bind the ParseObject to the target ParseClient instance. This is unnecessary if Publicize is called on the client.
testObject.Bind(client);

// Set some value on the object.
testObject.Set("someValue", "This is a value.");

// See that the ObjectId of an unsaved object is null;
Console.WriteLine(testObject.ObjectId);

// Save the object to the target Parse Server instance.
await testObject.SaveAsync();

// See that the ObjectId of a saved object is non-null;
Console.WriteLine(testObject.ObjectId);

// Query the object back down from the server to check that it was actually saved.
Console.WriteLine((await client.GetQuery("TestClass").WhereEqualTo("objectId", testObject.ObjectId).FirstAsync()).Get<string>("someValue"));

// Mutate some value on the object.
testObject.Set("someValue", "This is another value.");

// Save the object again.
await testObject.SaveAsync();

// Query the object again to see that the change was made.
Console.WriteLine((await client.GetQuery("TestClass").WhereEqualTo("objectId", testObject.ObjectId).FirstAsync()).Get<string>("someValue"));

// Store the object's objectId so it can be verified that it was deleted later.
var testObjectId = testObject.ObjectId;

// Delete the object.
await testObject.DeleteAsync();

// Check that the object was deleted from the server.
Console.WriteLine(await client.GetQuery("TestClass").WhereEqualTo("objectId", testObjectId).FirstOrDefaultAsync() == null);

// Deauthenticate the user again.
await client.LogOutAsync();

Local Builds

You can build the SDK on any system with the MSBuild or .NET Core CLI installed. Results can be found under either the Release/netstandard2.0 or Debug/netstandard2.0 in the bin folder unless a non-standard build configuration is used.

.NET Core CLI

dotnet build Parse.sln