A WCF service can be self-hosting using a console application or Windows Forms applications. Hosting a WCF service in any managed .Net application is called self-hosting. Now the following is the procedure for creating a WCF service and hosting it in a console application. Hosting Environment Requirements:
- Availability: When do you want to be able to reach your service?
- Reliability: What happens when your service somehow breaks? How does this affect other consumers?
- Manageability: Do you need easy access to information about what is happening on the host where WCF services live?
- Versioning: Do you need to support older versions of the service? Do you know who is consuming your services?
- Deployment: What is your deployment model? Are you installing through the Microsoft Installer process and Visual Studio deployment packages, or is xcopy sufficient?
- State: Are your services stateless? Do you need sessions?
The following are the various options available for hosting a WCF Service:
- Self-Hosting
- Windows Service
- Internet Information Services (IIS)
- Windows Activation Services (WAS)
