NreKnowledgebaseClient

Provides a client API to access the NRE Knowledgebase https://wiki.openraildata.com/index.php?title=KnowledgeBase

Using the library

The Knowedgebase class has properties (IKnowedgebase interface) and async methods (IKnowedgebaseAsync interface) to easily access the knowledgebase data.

The Knowedgebase constructor requires an implementation of IKnowledgebaseSource. The library provides 2 implementations of this:

• NationalRailEnquiriesSource : this connects to https://opendata.nationalrail.co.uk to download the knowledgebase
• FileSource : this uses local files to load the knowledgebase

Using NationalRailEnquiriesSource

NationalRailEnquiriesSource requires being initialised before it can get any knowledgebase data. You need to have a registered user on https://opendata.nationalrail.co.uk and to have enabled the Knowledgebase feed. It implementsIDispose to ensure it cleans itself up.

    using (var source = new NationalRailEnquiriesSource(new HttpClient(), logger))
    {
        await source.Initiate(user, password, CancellationToken.None);
        var knowledgebase = new Knowledgebase(source, logger);
        var tocs = await knowledgebase.GetTocs(CancellationToken.None);
        ...
    }

Using FileSource

FileSource requires being initialised with a dictionary with the location of the knowledgebase files. It does not require all knowledgebase subjects to be configured. The library throws KnowledgebaseException if a knowledgebase subject is not configured or the file does not exist.

    var sourceFiles = new Dictionary<KnowedgebaseSubjects, string>()
        {
            { KnowedgebaseSubjects.TicketTypes, "Data/TicketTypes.xml" },
            { KnowedgebaseSubjects.TicketRestrictions, "Data/TicketRestrictions.xml" },
            { KnowedgebaseSubjects.Promotions, "Data/Promotions.xml" },
            { KnowedgebaseSubjects.Incidents, "Data/Incidents.xml" },
            { KnowedgebaseSubjects.TocServiceIndicators, "Data/ServiceIndicators.xml" },
            { KnowedgebaseSubjects.Stations, "Data/Stations.xml" },
            { KnowedgebaseSubjects.Tocs, "Data/Tocs.xml" },
        };

    var knowledgebase = new Knowledgebase(new FileSource(sourceFiles, logger), logger);

    var tocs = await knowledgebase.GetTocs(CancellationToken.None);

Build and Tests

The library has a set of unit tests.
LiveKnowledgebaseTest is an integration test class that call the NRE web site. Need to have your user and password set as environment variables NRE_USER and NRE_PASSWORD. To run these tests need to delete the skip parameters.

Library Dependencies

The library is .NetStandard2.0 and depends upon:

• Microsoft.AspNet.WebApi.Client
• Serilog for logging

Generating the xml classes

Run the generateClasses.ps1 powershell script found in the schemas folder.

The Fares schema "http://nationalrail.co.uk/xml/ticket" generates an incompatible ClassEnumeration, manually change the TicketTypeDescriptionStructure.Class property to be a string to stop deserialisation issues.