How Web API returns multiple types

Question

I am just wondering whether it is possible to return multiple types in a single Web Api. For example, I want an api to return both lists of customers and orders (these two sets of data may or may not relate to each other?

Answer 1

To return multiple types, you can wrap them into anonymous type, there are two possible approaches:

public HttpResponseMessage Get() {     var listInt = new List<int>() { 1, 2 };     var listString = new List<string>() { "a", "b" };      return ControllerContext.Request         .CreateResponse(HttpStatusCode.OK, new { listInt, listString }); } 

Or:

public object Get() {     var listInt = new List<int>() { 1, 2 };     var listString = new List<string>() { "a", "b" };      return  new { listInt, listString }; } 

Also remember that The XML serializer does not support anonymous types. So, you have to ensure that request should have header:

Accept: application/json 

in order to accept json format