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.NET API Engineering Path
Progress from modern C# API foundations to intermediate endpoint design, advanced EF Core performance, and pro-grade operations.
Level: Advanced. Track: Typed backend. Audience: C# developers who want a complete basic-to-pro path for professional ASP.NET Core API ownership.
Capstone: A production-grade order API with typed contracts, validation, EF Core query boundaries, health checks, hosted work, integration tests, and operational notes.
Outcomes
- Move from modern C# basics into typed minimal API contracts with reviewable failure modes.
- Design advanced EF Core read paths with projections, limits, and query review evidence.
- Operate pro-grade APIs with integration tests, health checks, structured logs, hosted services, and shutdown behavior.
Stack
- C#
- ASP.NET Core
- EF Core
- OpenAPI
- xUnit
Course sections
- Basic: modern C# API foundations — Establish records, nullable references, project boundaries, dependency direction, options, and cancellation before designing endpoints.
- Intermediate: typed endpoint design — Shape minimal API routes with typed results, visible DI, validation filters, authorization policies, and consistent problem details.
- Advanced: EF Core performance — Make read and write paths measurable with projections, tracking choices, transaction boundaries, concurrency handling, and generated SQL notes.
- Pro: operations and reliability — Prove the host is production-ready with integration tests, health signals, logging, hosted workers, graceful shutdown, deploy checks, and incident notes.
Professional roadmap
- Basic contract layer — Define records, nullable-safe request handling, validated options, and cancellation-aware service interfaces. Evidence: Compiler-clean C# contracts plus a short invariant note.
- Intermediate endpoint layer — Return explicit success, validation, not-found, and problem responses from minimal APIs. Evidence: Typed endpoint signatures plus OpenAPI output reviewed for each route.
- Advanced query review — Replace broad entity loading with projections, limits, and documented tracking decisions. Evidence: Generated SQL notes, pagination behavior, and a read-model regression test.
- Pro operations-ready host — Add health checks, structured logs, cancellable hosted work, HTTP integration tests, and deploy notes. Evidence: WebApplicationFactory tests, readiness documentation, worker shutdown proof, and runbook commands.
Portfolio artifacts
- Typed order API
- Dependency direction notes
- OpenAPI contract review
- Error contract matrix
- EF Core query review notes
- Concurrency test
- Hosted worker
- Integration test project
- Operations runbook
- Incident review note
Lessons
- Modern C# API Foundations — Use records, nullable references, async methods, and options to establish reliable service contracts. 34 min.
- Project Structure and Dependency Injection — Split API, application, and infrastructure responsibilities so dependency direction stays reviewable from the first feature. 38 min.
- Typed Minimal APIs — Keep endpoints compact while preserving explicit result shapes and discoverable contracts. 36 min.
- Validation, Auth, and Problem Details — Design endpoint filters, authorization policies, and problem responses as one consistent contract instead of scattered checks. 39 min.
- EF Core Performance Boundaries — Load the data you need, track only what you change, and spot query problems before production. 40 min.
- EF Core Write Transactions and Concurrency — Make write paths safe under retries, concurrency conflicts, and partial failures with explicit transaction boundaries. 42 min.
- Testing, Health, and Hosted Services — Add integration tests, health checks, structured logs, and a background worker that shuts down gracefully. 45 min.
- Observability, Deploys, and Incident Runbooks — Connect logs, health, metrics, release checks, and rollback decisions into an operations playbook a teammate can execute. 46 min.
Canonical course URL