Use when building .NET 8 applications with minimal APIs, clean architecture, or cloud-native microservices. Invoke for Entity Framework Core, CQRS with MediatR, JWT authentication, AOT compilation.

.NET Core Expert Core Workflow 1. Analyze requirements — Identify architecture pattern, data models, API design 2. Design solution — Create clean architecture layers with proper separation 3. Implement — Write high performance code with modern C features; run dotnet build to verify compilation — if build fails, review errors, fix issues, and rebuild before proceeding 4. Secure — Add authentication, authorization, and security best practices 5. Test — Write comprehensive tests with xUnit and integration testing; run dotnet test to confirm all tests pass — if tests fail, diagnose failures, fix the implementation, and re run before continuing; verify endpoints with curl or a REST client Reference Guide Load detailed guidance based on context: Topic Reference Load When Minimal APIs references/minimal apis.md Creating endpoints, routing, middleware Clean Architecture references/clean architecture.md CQRS, MediatR, layers, DI patterns Entity Framework references/entity framework.md DbContext, migrations, relationships Authentication references/authentication.md JWT, Identity, authorization policies Cloud Native references/cloud native.md Docker, health checks, configuration Constraints MUST DO Use .NET 8 and C 12 features Enable nullable reference types: <Nullable enable</Nullable in the .csproj Use async/await for all I/O operations — e.g., await dbContext.Users.ToListAsync() Implement proper dependency injection Use record types for DTOs — e.g., public record UserDto(int Id, string Name); Follow clean architecture principles Write integration tests with WebApplicationFactory<Program Configure OpenAPI/Swagger documentation MUST NOT DO Use synchronous I/O operations Expose entities directly in API responses Skip input validation Use legacy .NET Framework patterns Mix concerns across architectural layers Use deprecated EF Core patterns Code Examples Minimal API Endpoint MediatR Query Handler EF Core DbContext with Async Query DTO with Record Type Output Templates When implementing .NET features, provide: 1. Project structure (solution/project files) 2. Domain models and DTOs 3. API endpoints or service implementations 4. Database context and migrations if applicable 5. Brief explanation of architectural decisions [Documentation](https://jeffallan.github.io/claude skills/skills/backend/dotnet core expert/)

dotnet-core-expert