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  • How to tell what name RIA Services/EF Model uses for Associations?

    - by Nick Gotch
    Hi, I'm working on a C#.NET 3.5 WCF RIA Services app and having an issue with my Entity Framework model. My entity Foo is mapped to a DB table and has a primary key called FooId. My Bar is mapped to a DB view. I've selectively designed this view to generate a composite key in the EF using two of the columns (by making sure they were non-nullable and the others are all nullable. This was done using NULLIF and ISNULL in the view design.) I'm able to add this view to the model with no problem but I keep running into an issue when I try to map an association between the two. Foo should contain many Bars but I keep getting the following error when I add the association: Unable to retrieve AssociationType for association 'FK_Bar_Foo' According to this page, it looks like this might work if I can properly name the association (since RIA Services looks for specific names.) I've tried several variants of names that match the pattern of other associations with no success. Does anyone know if there's a place I can look to find out what name it's looking for? Thanks,

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  • How To Update EF 4 Entity In ASP.NET MVC 3?

    - by Jason Evans
    Hi there. I have 2 projects - a class library containing an EDM Entity Framework model and a seperate ASP.NET MVC project. I'm having problems with how your suppose to edit and save changes to an entity using MVC. In my controller I have: public class UserController : Controller { public ActionResult Edit(int id) { var rep = new UserRepository(); var user = rep.GetById(id); return View(user); } [HttpPost] public ActionResult Edit(User user) { var rep = new UserRepository(); rep.Update(user); return View(user); } } My UserRepository has an Update method like this: public void Update(User user) { using (var context = new PDS_FMPEntities()) { context.Users.Attach(testUser); context.ObjectStateManager.ChangeObjectState(testUser, EntityState.Modified); context.SaveChanges(); } } Now, when I click 'Save' on the edit user page, the parameter user only contains two values populated: Id, and FirstName. I take it that is due to the fact that I'm only displaying those two properties in the view. My question is this, if I'm updating the user's firstname, and then want to save it, what am I suppose to do about the other User properties which were not shown on the view, since they now contain 0 or NULL values in the user object? I've been reading a lot about using stub entities, but I'm getting nowhere fast, in that none of the examples I've seen actually work. i.e. I keep getting EntityKey related exceptions. Can someone point me to a good tutorial/example of how to update EF 4 entities using a repository class, called by an MVC front-end? Cheers. Jas.

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  • EF code first error "The specified index already exists. [ IX_Id ]" for object tree

    - by PascalN
    Using EF code first 4.3 I'm trying to model an object tree with a required-required relationships and a required-optional relationships. Here is a simple representation of those classes public class Top { public int Id { get; set; } public virtual Middle Middle { get; set; } } public class Middle { public int Id { get; set; } public virtual Child Child { get; set; } } public class Child { public int Id { get; set; } } Here is the OnModelCreating code modelBuilder.Entity<Top>().HasRequired(t => t.Middle).WithRequiredPrincipal().WillCascadeOnDelete(); modelBuilder.Entity<Middle>().HasRequired(t => t.Child).WithOptional().WillCascadeOnDelete(); This produces the error "The specified index already exists. [ IX_Id ]" on SQLCE After checking the db schema, both model binder fluent API configuration lines create an index IX_Id on the table Middles. Does anyone know how to work around that problem? Is there a way to set the index name? Thank you! Pascal

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  • Perl: Compare and edit underlying structure in hash

    - by Mahfuzur Rahman Pallab
    I have a hash of complex structure and I want to perform a search and replace. The first hash is like the following: $VAR1 = { abc => { 123 => ["xx", "yy", "zy"], 456 => ["ab", "cd", "ef"] }, def => { 659 => ["wx", "yg", "kl"], 456 => ["as", "sd", "df"] }, mno => { 987 => ["lk", "dm", "sd"] }, } and I want to iteratively search for all '123'/'456' elements, and if a match is found, I need to do a comparison of the sublayer, i.e. of ['ab','cd','ef'] and ['as','sd','df'] and in this case, keep only the one with ['ab','cd','ef']. So the output will be as follows: $VAR1 = { abc => { 123 => ["xx", "yy", "zy"], 456 => ["ab", "cd", "ef"] }, def => { 659 => ["wx", "yg", "kl"] }, mno => { 987 => ["lk", "dm", "sd"] }, } So the deletion is based on the substructure, and not index. How can it be done? Thanks for the help!! Lets assume that I will declare the values to be kept, i.e. I will keep 456 = ["ab", "cd", "ef"] based on a predeclared value of ["ab", "cd", "ef"] and delete any other instance of 456 anywhere else. The search has to be for every key. so the code will go through the hash, first taking 123 = ["xx", "yy", "zy"] and compare it against itself throughout the rest of the hash, if no match is found, do nothing. If a match is found, like in the case of 456 = ["ab", "cd", "ef"], it will compare the two, and as I have said that in case of a match the one with ["ab", "cd", "ef"] would be kept, it will keep 456 = ["ab", "cd", "ef"] and discard any other instances of 456 anywhere else in the hash, i.e. it will delete 456 = ["as", "sd", "df"] in this case.

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  • Inheritance Mapping Strategies with Entity Framework Code First CTP5: Part 3 – Table per Concrete Type (TPC) and Choosing Strategy Guidelines

    - by mortezam
    This is the third (and last) post in a series that explains different approaches to map an inheritance hierarchy with EF Code First. I've described these strategies in previous posts: Part 1 – Table per Hierarchy (TPH) Part 2 – Table per Type (TPT)In today’s blog post I am going to discuss Table per Concrete Type (TPC) which completes the inheritance mapping strategies supported by EF Code First. At the end of this post I will provide some guidelines to choose an inheritance strategy mainly based on what we've learned in this series. TPC and Entity Framework in the Past Table per Concrete type is somehow the simplest approach suggested, yet using TPC with EF is one of those concepts that has not been covered very well so far and I've seen in some resources that it was even discouraged. The reason for that is just because Entity Data Model Designer in VS2010 doesn't support TPC (even though the EF runtime does). That basically means if you are following EF's Database-First or Model-First approaches then configuring TPC requires manually writing XML in the EDMX file which is not considered to be a fun practice. Well, no more. You'll see that with Code First, creating TPC is perfectly possible with fluent API just like other strategies and you don't need to avoid TPC due to the lack of designer support as you would probably do in other EF approaches. Table per Concrete Type (TPC)In Table per Concrete type (aka Table per Concrete class) we use exactly one table for each (nonabstract) class. All properties of a class, including inherited properties, can be mapped to columns of this table, as shown in the following figure: As you can see, the SQL schema is not aware of the inheritance; effectively, we’ve mapped two unrelated tables to a more expressive class structure. If the base class was concrete, then an additional table would be needed to hold instances of that class. I have to emphasize that there is no relationship between the database tables, except for the fact that they share some similar columns. TPC Implementation in Code First Just like the TPT implementation, we need to specify a separate table for each of the subclasses. We also need to tell Code First that we want all of the inherited properties to be mapped as part of this table. In CTP5, there is a new helper method on EntityMappingConfiguration class called MapInheritedProperties that exactly does this for us. Here is the complete object model as well as the fluent API to create a TPC mapping: public abstract class BillingDetail {     public int BillingDetailId { get; set; }     public string Owner { get; set; }     public string Number { get; set; } }          public class BankAccount : BillingDetail {     public string BankName { get; set; }     public string Swift { get; set; } }          public class CreditCard : BillingDetail {     public int CardType { get; set; }     public string ExpiryMonth { get; set; }     public string ExpiryYear { get; set; } }      public class InheritanceMappingContext : DbContext {     public DbSet<BillingDetail> BillingDetails { get; set; }              protected override void OnModelCreating(ModelBuilder modelBuilder)     {         modelBuilder.Entity<BankAccount>().Map(m =>         {             m.MapInheritedProperties();             m.ToTable("BankAccounts");         });         modelBuilder.Entity<CreditCard>().Map(m =>         {             m.MapInheritedProperties();             m.ToTable("CreditCards");         });                 } } The Importance of EntityMappingConfiguration ClassAs a side note, it worth mentioning that EntityMappingConfiguration class turns out to be a key type for inheritance mapping in Code First. Here is an snapshot of this class: namespace System.Data.Entity.ModelConfiguration.Configuration.Mapping {     public class EntityMappingConfiguration<TEntityType> where TEntityType : class     {         public ValueConditionConfiguration Requires(string discriminator);         public void ToTable(string tableName);         public void MapInheritedProperties();     } } As you have seen so far, we used its Requires method to customize TPH. We also used its ToTable method to create a TPT and now we are using its MapInheritedProperties along with ToTable method to create our TPC mapping. TPC Configuration is Not Done Yet!We are not quite done with our TPC configuration and there is more into this story even though the fluent API we saw perfectly created a TPC mapping for us in the database. To see why, let's start working with our object model. For example, the following code creates two new objects of BankAccount and CreditCard types and tries to add them to the database: using (var context = new InheritanceMappingContext()) {     BankAccount bankAccount = new BankAccount();     CreditCard creditCard = new CreditCard() { CardType = 1 };                      context.BillingDetails.Add(bankAccount);     context.BillingDetails.Add(creditCard);     context.SaveChanges(); } Running this code throws an InvalidOperationException with this message: The changes to the database were committed successfully, but an error occurred while updating the object context. The ObjectContext might be in an inconsistent state. Inner exception message: AcceptChanges cannot continue because the object's key values conflict with another object in the ObjectStateManager. Make sure that the key values are unique before calling AcceptChanges. The reason we got this exception is because DbContext.SaveChanges() internally invokes SaveChanges method of its internal ObjectContext. ObjectContext's SaveChanges method on its turn by default calls AcceptAllChanges after it has performed the database modifications. AcceptAllChanges method merely iterates over all entries in ObjectStateManager and invokes AcceptChanges on each of them. Since the entities are in Added state, AcceptChanges method replaces their temporary EntityKey with a regular EntityKey based on the primary key values (i.e. BillingDetailId) that come back from the database and that's where the problem occurs since both the entities have been assigned the same value for their primary key by the database (i.e. on both BillingDetailId = 1) and the problem is that ObjectStateManager cannot track objects of the same type (i.e. BillingDetail) with the same EntityKey value hence it throws. If you take a closer look at the TPC's SQL schema above, you'll see why the database generated the same values for the primary keys: the BillingDetailId column in both BankAccounts and CreditCards table has been marked as identity. How to Solve The Identity Problem in TPC As you saw, using SQL Server’s int identity columns doesn't work very well together with TPC since there will be duplicate entity keys when inserting in subclasses tables with all having the same identity seed. Therefore, to solve this, either a spread seed (where each table has its own initial seed value) will be needed, or a mechanism other than SQL Server’s int identity should be used. Some other RDBMSes have other mechanisms allowing a sequence (identity) to be shared by multiple tables, and something similar can be achieved with GUID keys in SQL Server. While using GUID keys, or int identity keys with different starting seeds will solve the problem but yet another solution would be to completely switch off identity on the primary key property. As a result, we need to take the responsibility of providing unique keys when inserting records to the database. We will go with this solution since it works regardless of which database engine is used. Switching Off Identity in Code First We can switch off identity simply by placing DatabaseGenerated attribute on the primary key property and pass DatabaseGenerationOption.None to its constructor. DatabaseGenerated attribute is a new data annotation which has been added to System.ComponentModel.DataAnnotations namespace in CTP5: public abstract class BillingDetail {     [DatabaseGenerated(DatabaseGenerationOption.None)]     public int BillingDetailId { get; set; }     public string Owner { get; set; }     public string Number { get; set; } } As always, we can achieve the same result by using fluent API, if you prefer that: modelBuilder.Entity<BillingDetail>()             .Property(p => p.BillingDetailId)             .HasDatabaseGenerationOption(DatabaseGenerationOption.None); Working With The Object Model Our TPC mapping is ready and we can try adding new records to the database. But, like I said, now we need to take care of providing unique keys when creating new objects: using (var context = new InheritanceMappingContext()) {     BankAccount bankAccount = new BankAccount()      {          BillingDetailId = 1                          };     CreditCard creditCard = new CreditCard()      {          BillingDetailId = 2,         CardType = 1     };                      context.BillingDetails.Add(bankAccount);     context.BillingDetails.Add(creditCard);     context.SaveChanges(); } Polymorphic Associations with TPC is Problematic The main problem with this approach is that it doesn’t support Polymorphic Associations very well. After all, in the database, associations are represented as foreign key relationships and in TPC, the subclasses are all mapped to different tables so a polymorphic association to their base class (abstract BillingDetail in our example) cannot be represented as a simple foreign key relationship. For example, consider the the domain model we introduced here where User has a polymorphic association with BillingDetail. This would be problematic in our TPC Schema, because if User has a many-to-one relationship with BillingDetail, the Users table would need a single foreign key column, which would have to refer both concrete subclass tables. This isn’t possible with regular foreign key constraints. Schema Evolution with TPC is Complex A further conceptual problem with this mapping strategy is that several different columns, of different tables, share exactly the same semantics. This makes schema evolution more complex. For example, a change to a base class property results in changes to multiple columns. It also makes it much more difficult to implement database integrity constraints that apply to all subclasses. Generated SQLLet's examine SQL output for polymorphic queries in TPC mapping. For example, consider this polymorphic query for all BillingDetails and the resulting SQL statements that being executed in the database: var query = from b in context.BillingDetails select b; Just like the SQL query generated by TPT mapping, the CASE statements that you see in the beginning of the query is merely to ensure columns that are irrelevant for a particular row have NULL values in the returning flattened table. (e.g. BankName for a row that represents a CreditCard type). TPC's SQL Queries are Union Based As you can see in the above screenshot, the first SELECT uses a FROM-clause subquery (which is selected with a red rectangle) to retrieve all instances of BillingDetails from all concrete class tables. The tables are combined with a UNION operator, and a literal (in this case, 0 and 1) is inserted into the intermediate result; (look at the lines highlighted in yellow.) EF reads this to instantiate the correct class given the data from a particular row. A union requires that the queries that are combined, project over the same columns; hence, EF has to pad and fill up nonexistent columns with NULL. This query will really perform well since here we can let the database optimizer find the best execution plan to combine rows from several tables. There is also no Joins involved so it has a better performance than the SQL queries generated by TPT where a Join is required between the base and subclasses tables. Choosing Strategy GuidelinesBefore we get into this discussion, I want to emphasize that there is no one single "best strategy fits all scenarios" exists. As you saw, each of the approaches have their own advantages and drawbacks. Here are some rules of thumb to identify the best strategy in a particular scenario: If you don’t require polymorphic associations or queries, lean toward TPC—in other words, if you never or rarely query for BillingDetails and you have no class that has an association to BillingDetail base class. I recommend TPC (only) for the top level of your class hierarchy, where polymorphism isn’t usually required, and when modification of the base class in the future is unlikely. If you do require polymorphic associations or queries, and subclasses declare relatively few properties (particularly if the main difference between subclasses is in their behavior), lean toward TPH. Your goal is to minimize the number of nullable columns and to convince yourself (and your DBA) that a denormalized schema won’t create problems in the long run. If you do require polymorphic associations or queries, and subclasses declare many properties (subclasses differ mainly by the data they hold), lean toward TPT. Or, depending on the width and depth of your inheritance hierarchy and the possible cost of joins versus unions, use TPC. By default, choose TPH only for simple problems. For more complex cases (or when you’re overruled by a data modeler insisting on the importance of nullability constraints and normalization), you should consider the TPT strategy. But at that point, ask yourself whether it may not be better to remodel inheritance as delegation in the object model (delegation is a way of making composition as powerful for reuse as inheritance). Complex inheritance is often best avoided for all sorts of reasons unrelated to persistence or ORM. EF acts as a buffer between the domain and relational models, but that doesn’t mean you can ignore persistence concerns when designing your classes. SummaryIn this series, we focused on one of the main structural aspect of the object/relational paradigm mismatch which is inheritance and discussed how EF solve this problem as an ORM solution. We learned about the three well-known inheritance mapping strategies and their implementations in EF Code First. Hopefully it gives you a better insight about the mapping of inheritance hierarchies as well as choosing the best strategy for your particular scenario. Happy New Year and Happy Code-Firsting! References ADO.NET team blog Java Persistence with Hibernate book a { color: #5A99FF; } a:visited { color: #5A99FF; } .title { padding-bottom: 5px; font-family: Segoe UI; font-size: 11pt; font-weight: bold; padding-top: 15px; } .code, .typeName { font-family: consolas; } .typeName { color: #2b91af; } .padTop5 { padding-top: 5px; } .padTop10 { padding-top: 10px; } .exception { background-color: #f0f0f0; font-style: italic; padding-bottom: 5px; padding-left: 5px; padding-top: 5px; padding-right: 5px; }

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  • Announcing Entity Framework Code-First (CTP 5 release)

    In this article, Scott provides a detailed coverage of Entity Framework Code-First CTP 5 release and the features included with the build. He begins with the steps required to install EF Code First. Scott then examines the usage of EF Code First to create a model layer for the Northwind sample database in a series of steps. Towards the end of the article, Scott examines the usage of UI Validation and few addtional EF Code First Improvements shipped with CTP 5.

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  • Winnipeg Code Camp EF4 Resources

    - by Aaron Kowall
    I had fun presenting “What’s new in Entity Framework 4” at the Winnipeg Code Camp today. I mentioned some resources on my deck that I thought I’d include here in my blog. •EF 4.0 Hands on Labs •EF CTP  5 (has the new DbContext and CodeFirst support)   •MSDN Data Developer Center: MSDN.com/Data •ADO.NET Team Blog •EF Design Blog •How to choose an inheritance strategy Programming Entity Framework, Second Edition by Julia Lerman

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  • Entity Framework and layer separation

    - by Thomas
    I'm trying to work a bit with Entity Framework and I got a question regarding the separation of layers. I usually use the UI - BLL - DAL approach and I'm wondering how to use EF here. My DAL would usually be something like GetPerson(id) { // some sql return new Person(...) } BLL: GetPerson(id) { Return personDL.GetPerson(id) } UI: Person p = personBL.GetPerson(id) My question now is: since EF creates my model and DAL, is it a good idea to wrap EF inside my own DAL or is it just a waste of time? If I don't need to wrap EF would I still place my Model.esmx inside its own class library or would it be fine to just place it inside my BLL and work some there? I can't really see the reason to wrap EF inside my own DAL but I want to know what other people are doing. So instead of having the above, I would leave out the DAL and just do: BLL: GetPerson(id) { using (TestEntities context = new TestEntities()) { var result = from p in context.Persons.Where(p => p.Id = id) select p; } } What to do?

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  • What are good design practices when working with Entity Framework

    - by AD
    This will apply mostly for an asp.net application where the data is not accessed via soa. Meaning that you get access to the objects loaded from the framework, not Transfer Objects, although some recommendation still apply. This is a community post, so please add to it as you see fit. Applies to: Entity Framework 1.0 shipped with Visual Studio 2008 sp1. Why pick EF in the first place? Considering it is a young technology with plenty of problems (see below), it may be a hard sell to get on the EF bandwagon for your project. However, it is the technology Microsoft is pushing (at the expense of Linq2Sql, which is a subset of EF). In addition, you may not be satisfied with NHibernate or other solutions out there. Whatever the reasons, there are people out there (including me) working with EF and life is not bad.make you think. EF and inheritance The first big subject is inheritance. EF does support mapping for inherited classes that are persisted in 2 ways: table per class and table the hierarchy. The modeling is easy and there are no programming issues with that part. (The following applies to table per class model as I don't have experience with table per hierarchy, which is, anyway, limited.) The real problem comes when you are trying to run queries that include one or many objects that are part of an inheritance tree: the generated sql is incredibly awful, takes a long time to get parsed by the EF and takes a long time to execute as well. This is a real show stopper. Enough that EF should probably not be used with inheritance or as little as possible. Here is an example of how bad it was. My EF model had ~30 classes, ~10 of which were part of an inheritance tree. On running a query to get one item from the Base class, something as simple as Base.Get(id), the generated SQL was over 50,000 characters. Then when you are trying to return some Associations, it degenerates even more, going as far as throwing SQL exceptions about not being able to query more than 256 tables at once. Ok, this is bad, EF concept is to allow you to create your object structure without (or with as little as possible) consideration on the actual database implementation of your table. It completely fails at this. So, recommendations? Avoid inheritance if you can, the performance will be so much better. Use it sparingly where you have to. In my opinion, this makes EF a glorified sql-generation tool for querying, but there are still advantages to using it. And ways to implement mechanism that are similar to inheritance. Bypassing inheritance with Interfaces First thing to know with trying to get some kind of inheritance going with EF is that you cannot assign a non-EF-modeled class a base class. Don't even try it, it will get overwritten by the modeler. So what to do? You can use interfaces to enforce that classes implement some functionality. For example here is a IEntity interface that allow you to define Associations between EF entities where you don't know at design time what the type of the entity would be. public enum EntityTypes{ Unknown = -1, Dog = 0, Cat } public interface IEntity { int EntityID { get; } string Name { get; } Type EntityType { get; } } public partial class Dog : IEntity { // implement EntityID and Name which could actually be fields // from your EF model Type EntityType{ get{ return EntityTypes.Dog; } } } Using this IEntity, you can then work with undefined associations in other classes // lets take a class that you defined in your model. // that class has a mapping to the columns: PetID, PetType public partial class Person { public IEntity GetPet() { return IEntityController.Get(PetID,PetType); } } which makes use of some extension functions: public class IEntityController { static public IEntity Get(int id, EntityTypes type) { switch (type) { case EntityTypes.Dog: return Dog.Get(id); case EntityTypes.Cat: return Cat.Get(id); default: throw new Exception("Invalid EntityType"); } } } Not as neat as having plain inheritance, particularly considering you have to store the PetType in an extra database field, but considering the performance gains, I would not look back. It also cannot model one-to-many, many-to-many relationship, but with creative uses of 'Union' it could be made to work. Finally, it creates the side effet of loading data in a property/function of the object, which you need to be careful about. Using a clear naming convention like GetXYZ() helps in that regards. Compiled Queries Entity Framework performance is not as good as direct database access with ADO (obviously) or Linq2SQL. There are ways to improve it however, one of which is compiling your queries. The performance of a compiled query is similar to Linq2Sql. What is a compiled query? It is simply a query for which you tell the framework to keep the parsed tree in memory so it doesn't need to be regenerated the next time you run it. So the next run, you will save the time it takes to parse the tree. Do not discount that as it is a very costly operation that gets even worse with more complex queries. There are 2 ways to compile a query: creating an ObjectQuery with EntitySQL and using CompiledQuery.Compile() function. (Note that by using an EntityDataSource in your page, you will in fact be using ObjectQuery with EntitySQL, so that gets compiled and cached). An aside here in case you don't know what EntitySQL is. It is a string-based way of writing queries against the EF. Here is an example: "select value dog from Entities.DogSet as dog where dog.ID = @ID". The syntax is pretty similar to SQL syntax. You can also do pretty complex object manipulation, which is well explained [here][1]. Ok, so here is how to do it using ObjectQuery< string query = "select value dog " + "from Entities.DogSet as dog " + "where dog.ID = @ID"; ObjectQuery<Dog> oQuery = new ObjectQuery<Dog>(query, EntityContext.Instance)); oQuery.Parameters.Add(new ObjectParameter("ID", id)); oQuery.EnablePlanCaching = true; return oQuery.FirstOrDefault(); The first time you run this query, the framework will generate the expression tree and keep it in memory. So the next time it gets executed, you will save on that costly step. In that example EnablePlanCaching = true, which is unnecessary since that is the default option. The other way to compile a query for later use is the CompiledQuery.Compile method. This uses a delegate: static readonly Func<Entities, int, Dog> query_GetDog = CompiledQuery.Compile<Entities, int, Dog>((ctx, id) => ctx.DogSet.FirstOrDefault(it => it.ID == id)); or using linq static readonly Func<Entities, int, Dog> query_GetDog = CompiledQuery.Compile<Entities, int, Dog>((ctx, id) => (from dog in ctx.DogSet where dog.ID == id select dog).FirstOrDefault()); to call the query: query_GetDog.Invoke( YourContext, id ); The advantage of CompiledQuery is that the syntax of your query is checked at compile time, where as EntitySQL is not. However, there are other consideration... Includes Lets say you want to have the data for the dog owner to be returned by the query to avoid making 2 calls to the database. Easy to do, right? EntitySQL string query = "select value dog " + "from Entities.DogSet as dog " + "where dog.ID = @ID"; ObjectQuery<Dog> oQuery = new ObjectQuery<Dog>(query, EntityContext.Instance)).Include("Owner"); oQuery.Parameters.Add(new ObjectParameter("ID", id)); oQuery.EnablePlanCaching = true; return oQuery.FirstOrDefault(); CompiledQuery static readonly Func<Entities, int, Dog> query_GetDog = CompiledQuery.Compile<Entities, int, Dog>((ctx, id) => (from dog in ctx.DogSet.Include("Owner") where dog.ID == id select dog).FirstOrDefault()); Now, what if you want to have the Include parametrized? What I mean is that you want to have a single Get() function that is called from different pages that care about different relationships for the dog. One cares about the Owner, another about his FavoriteFood, another about his FavotireToy and so on. Basicly, you want to tell the query which associations to load. It is easy to do with EntitySQL public Dog Get(int id, string include) { string query = "select value dog " + "from Entities.DogSet as dog " + "where dog.ID = @ID"; ObjectQuery<Dog> oQuery = new ObjectQuery<Dog>(query, EntityContext.Instance)) .IncludeMany(include); oQuery.Parameters.Add(new ObjectParameter("ID", id)); oQuery.EnablePlanCaching = true; return oQuery.FirstOrDefault(); } The include simply uses the passed string. Easy enough. Note that it is possible to improve on the Include(string) function (that accepts only a single path) with an IncludeMany(string) that will let you pass a string of comma-separated associations to load. Look further in the extension section for this function. If we try to do it with CompiledQuery however, we run into numerous problems: The obvious static readonly Func<Entities, int, string, Dog> query_GetDog = CompiledQuery.Compile<Entities, int, string, Dog>((ctx, id, include) => (from dog in ctx.DogSet.Include(include) where dog.ID == id select dog).FirstOrDefault()); will choke when called with: query_GetDog.Invoke( YourContext, id, "Owner,FavoriteFood" ); Because, as mentionned above, Include() only wants to see a single path in the string and here we are giving it 2: "Owner" and "FavoriteFood" (which is not to be confused with "Owner.FavoriteFood"!). Then, let's use IncludeMany(), which is an extension function static readonly Func<Entities, int, string, Dog> query_GetDog = CompiledQuery.Compile<Entities, int, string, Dog>((ctx, id, include) => (from dog in ctx.DogSet.IncludeMany(include) where dog.ID == id select dog).FirstOrDefault()); Wrong again, this time it is because the EF cannot parse IncludeMany because it is not part of the functions that is recognizes: it is an extension. Ok, so you want to pass an arbitrary number of paths to your function and Includes() only takes a single one. What to do? You could decide that you will never ever need more than, say 20 Includes, and pass each separated strings in a struct to CompiledQuery. But now the query looks like this: from dog in ctx.DogSet.Include(include1).Include(include2).Include(include3) .Include(include4).Include(include5).Include(include6) .[...].Include(include19).Include(include20) where dog.ID == id select dog which is awful as well. Ok, then, but wait a minute. Can't we return an ObjectQuery< with CompiledQuery? Then set the includes on that? Well, that what I would have thought so as well: static readonly Func<Entities, int, ObjectQuery<Dog>> query_GetDog = CompiledQuery.Compile<Entities, int, string, ObjectQuery<Dog>>((ctx, id) => (ObjectQuery<Dog>)(from dog in ctx.DogSet where dog.ID == id select dog)); public Dog GetDog( int id, string include ) { ObjectQuery<Dog> oQuery = query_GetDog(id); oQuery = oQuery.IncludeMany(include); return oQuery.FirstOrDefault; } That should have worked, except that when you call IncludeMany (or Include, Where, OrderBy...) you invalidate the cached compiled query because it is an entirely new one now! So, the expression tree needs to be reparsed and you get that performance hit again. So what is the solution? You simply cannot use CompiledQueries with parametrized Includes. Use EntitySQL instead. This doesn't mean that there aren't uses for CompiledQueries. It is great for localized queries that will always be called in the same context. Ideally CompiledQuery should always be used because the syntax is checked at compile time, but due to limitation, that's not possible. An example of use would be: you may want to have a page that queries which two dogs have the same favorite food, which is a bit narrow for a BusinessLayer function, so you put it in your page and know exactly what type of includes are required. Passing more than 3 parameters to a CompiledQuery Func is limited to 5 parameters, of which the last one is the return type and the first one is your Entities object from the model. So that leaves you with 3 parameters. A pitance, but it can be improved on very easily. public struct MyParams { public string param1; public int param2; public DateTime param3; } static readonly Func<Entities, MyParams, IEnumerable<Dog>> query_GetDog = CompiledQuery.Compile<Entities, MyParams, IEnumerable<Dog>>((ctx, myParams) => from dog in ctx.DogSet where dog.Age == myParams.param2 && dog.Name == myParams.param1 and dog.BirthDate > myParams.param3 select dog); public List<Dog> GetSomeDogs( int age, string Name, DateTime birthDate ) { MyParams myParams = new MyParams(); myParams.param1 = name; myParams.param2 = age; myParams.param3 = birthDate; return query_GetDog(YourContext,myParams).ToList(); } Return Types (this does not apply to EntitySQL queries as they aren't compiled at the same time during execution as the CompiledQuery method) Working with Linq, you usually don't force the execution of the query until the very last moment, in case some other functions downstream wants to change the query in some way: static readonly Func<Entities, int, string, IEnumerable<Dog>> query_GetDog = CompiledQuery.Compile<Entities, int, string, IEnumerable<Dog>>((ctx, age, name) => from dog in ctx.DogSet where dog.Age == age && dog.Name == name select dog); public IEnumerable<Dog> GetSomeDogs( int age, string name ) { return query_GetDog(YourContext,age,name); } public void DataBindStuff() { IEnumerable<Dog> dogs = GetSomeDogs(4,"Bud"); // but I want the dogs ordered by BirthDate gridView.DataSource = dogs.OrderBy( it => it.BirthDate ); } What is going to happen here? By still playing with the original ObjectQuery (that is the actual return type of the Linq statement, which implements IEnumerable), it will invalidate the compiled query and be force to re-parse. So, the rule of thumb is to return a List< of objects instead. static readonly Func<Entities, int, string, IEnumerable<Dog>> query_GetDog = CompiledQuery.Compile<Entities, int, string, IEnumerable<Dog>>((ctx, age, name) => from dog in ctx.DogSet where dog.Age == age && dog.Name == name select dog); public List<Dog> GetSomeDogs( int age, string name ) { return query_GetDog(YourContext,age,name).ToList(); //<== change here } public void DataBindStuff() { List<Dog> dogs = GetSomeDogs(4,"Bud"); // but I want the dogs ordered by BirthDate gridView.DataSource = dogs.OrderBy( it => it.BirthDate ); } When you call ToList(), the query gets executed as per the compiled query and then, later, the OrderBy is executed against the objects in memory. It may be a little bit slower, but I'm not even sure. One sure thing is that you have no worries about mis-handling the ObjectQuery and invalidating the compiled query plan. Once again, that is not a blanket statement. ToList() is a defensive programming trick, but if you have a valid reason not to use ToList(), go ahead. There are many cases in which you would want to refine the query before executing it. Performance What is the performance impact of compiling a query? It can actually be fairly large. A rule of thumb is that compiling and caching the query for reuse takes at least double the time of simply executing it without caching. For complex queries (read inherirante), I have seen upwards to 10 seconds. So, the first time a pre-compiled query gets called, you get a performance hit. After that first hit, performance is noticeably better than the same non-pre-compiled query. Practically the same as Linq2Sql When you load a page with pre-compiled queries the first time you will get a hit. It will load in maybe 5-15 seconds (obviously more than one pre-compiled queries will end up being called), while subsequent loads will take less than 300ms. Dramatic difference, and it is up to you to decide if it is ok for your first user to take a hit or you want a script to call your pages to force a compilation of the queries. Can this query be cached? { Dog dog = from dog in YourContext.DogSet where dog.ID == id select dog; } No, ad-hoc Linq queries are not cached and you will incur the cost of generating the tree every single time you call it. Parametrized Queries Most search capabilities involve heavily parametrized queries. There are even libraries available that will let you build a parametrized query out of lamba expressions. The problem is that you cannot use pre-compiled queries with those. One way around that is to map out all the possible criteria in the query and flag which one you want to use: public struct MyParams { public string name; public bool checkName; public int age; public bool checkAge; } static readonly Func<Entities, MyParams, IEnumerable<Dog>> query_GetDog = CompiledQuery.Compile<Entities, MyParams, IEnumerable<Dog>>((ctx, myParams) => from dog in ctx.DogSet where (myParams.checkAge == true && dog.Age == myParams.age) && (myParams.checkName == true && dog.Name == myParams.name ) select dog); protected List<Dog> GetSomeDogs() { MyParams myParams = new MyParams(); myParams.name = "Bud"; myParams.checkName = true; myParams.age = 0; myParams.checkAge = false; return query_GetDog(YourContext,myParams).ToList(); } The advantage here is that you get all the benifits of a pre-compiled quert. The disadvantages are that you most likely will end up with a where clause that is pretty difficult to maintain, that you will incur a bigger penalty for pre-compiling the query and that each query you run is not as efficient as it could be (particularly with joins thrown in). Another way is to build an EntitySQL query piece by piece, like we all did with SQL. protected List<Dod> GetSomeDogs( string name, int age) { string query = "select value dog from Entities.DogSet where 1 = 1 "; if( !String.IsNullOrEmpty(name) ) query = query + " and dog.Name == @Name "; if( age > 0 ) query = query + " and dog.Age == @Age "; ObjectQuery<Dog> oQuery = new ObjectQuery<Dog>( query, YourContext ); if( !String.IsNullOrEmpty(name) ) oQuery.Parameters.Add( new ObjectParameter( "Name", name ) ); if( age > 0 ) oQuery.Parameters.Add( new ObjectParameter( "Age", age ) ); return oQuery.ToList(); } Here the problems are: - there is no syntax checking during compilation - each different combination of parameters generate a different query which will need to be pre-compiled when it is first run. In this case, there are only 4 different possible queries (no params, age-only, name-only and both params), but you can see that there can be way more with a normal world search. - Noone likes to concatenate strings! Another option is to query a large subset of the data and then narrow it down in memory. This is particularly useful if you are working with a definite subset of the data, like all the dogs in a city. You know there are a lot but you also know there aren't that many... so your CityDog search page can load all the dogs for the city in memory, which is a single pre-compiled query and then refine the results protected List<Dod> GetSomeDogs( string name, int age, string city) { string query = "select value dog from Entities.DogSet where dog.Owner.Address.City == @City "; ObjectQuery<Dog> oQuery = new ObjectQuery<Dog>( query, YourContext ); oQuery.Parameters.Add( new ObjectParameter( "City", city ) ); List<Dog> dogs = oQuery.ToList(); if( !String.IsNullOrEmpty(name) ) dogs = dogs.Where( it => it.Name == name ); if( age > 0 ) dogs = dogs.Where( it => it.Age == age ); return dogs; } It is particularly useful when you start displaying all the data then allow for filtering. Problems: - Could lead to serious data transfer if you are not careful about your subset. - You can only filter on the data that you returned. It means that if you don't return the Dog.Owner association, you will not be able to filter on the Dog.Owner.Name So what is the best solution? There isn't any. You need to pick the solution that works best for you and your problem: - Use lambda-based query building when you don't care about pre-compiling your queries. - Use fully-defined pre-compiled Linq query when your object structure is not too complex. - Use EntitySQL/string concatenation when the structure could be complex and when the possible number of different resulting queries are small (which means fewer pre-compilation hits). - Use in-memory filtering when you are working with a smallish subset of the data or when you had to fetch all of the data on the data at first anyway (if the performance is fine with all the data, then filtering in memory will not cause any time to be spent in the db). Singleton access The best way to deal with your context and entities accross all your pages is to use the singleton pattern: public sealed class YourContext { private const string instanceKey = "On3GoModelKey"; YourContext(){} public static YourEntities Instance { get { HttpContext context = HttpContext.Current; if( context == null ) return Nested.instance; if (context.Items[instanceKey] == null) { On3GoEntities entity = new On3GoEntities(); context.Items[instanceKey] = entity; } return (YourEntities)context.Items[instanceKey]; } } class Nested { // Explicit static constructor to tell C# compiler // not to mark type as beforefieldinit static Nested() { } internal static readonly YourEntities instance = new YourEntities(); } } NoTracking, is it worth it? When executing a query, you can tell the framework to track the objects it will return or not. What does it mean? With tracking enabled (the default option), the framework will track what is going on with the object (has it been modified? Created? Deleted?) and will also link objects together, when further queries are made from the database, which is what is of interest here. For example, lets assume that Dog with ID == 2 has an owner which ID == 10. Dog dog = (from dog in YourContext.DogSet where dog.ID == 2 select dog).FirstOrDefault(); //dog.OwnerReference.IsLoaded == false; Person owner = (from o in YourContext.PersonSet where o.ID == 10 select dog).FirstOrDefault(); //dog.OwnerReference.IsLoaded == true; If we were to do the same with no tracking, the result would be different. ObjectQuery<Dog> oDogQuery = (ObjectQuery<Dog>) (from dog in YourContext.DogSet where dog.ID == 2 select dog); oDogQuery.MergeOption = MergeOption.NoTracking; Dog dog = oDogQuery.FirstOrDefault(); //dog.OwnerReference.IsLoaded == false; ObjectQuery<Person> oPersonQuery = (ObjectQuery<Person>) (from o in YourContext.PersonSet where o.ID == 10 select o); oPersonQuery.MergeOption = MergeOption.NoTracking; Owner owner = oPersonQuery.FirstOrDefault(); //dog.OwnerReference.IsLoaded == false; Tracking is very useful and in a perfect world without performance issue, it would always be on. But in this world, there is a price for it, in terms of performance. So, should you use NoTracking to speed things up? It depends on what you are planning to use the data for. Is there any chance that the data your query with NoTracking can be used to make update/insert/delete in the database? If so, don't use NoTracking because associations are not tracked and will causes exceptions to be thrown. In a page where there are absolutly no updates to the database, you can use NoTracking. Mixing tracking and NoTracking is possible, but it requires you to be extra careful with updates/inserts/deletes. The problem is that if you mix then you risk having the framework trying to Attach() a NoTracking object to the context where another copy of the same object exist with tracking on. Basicly, what I am saying is that Dog dog1 = (from dog in YourContext.DogSet where dog.ID == 2).FirstOrDefault(); ObjectQuery<Dog> oDogQuery = (ObjectQuery<Dog>) (from dog in YourContext.DogSet where dog.ID == 2 select dog); oDogQuery.MergeOption = MergeOption.NoTracking; Dog dog2 = oDogQuery.FirstOrDefault(); dog1 and dog2 are 2 different objects, one tracked and one not. Using the detached object in an update/insert will force an Attach() that will say "Wait a minute, I do already have an object here with the same database key. Fail". And when you Attach() one object, all of its hierarchy gets attached as well, causing problems everywhere. Be extra careful. How much faster is it with NoTracking It depends on the queries. Some are much more succeptible to tracking than other. I don't have a fast an easy rule for it, but it helps. So I should use NoTracking everywhere then? Not exactly. There are some advantages to tracking object. The first one is that the object is cached, so subsequent call for that object will not hit the database. That cache is only valid for the lifetime of the YourEntities object, which, if you use the singleton code above, is the same as the page lifetime. One page request == one YourEntity object. So for multiple calls for the same object, it will load only once per page request. (Other caching mechanism could extend that). What happens when you are using NoTracking and try to load the same object multiple times? The database will be queried each time, so there is an impact there. How often do/should you call for the same object during a single page request? As little as possible of course, but it does happens. Also remember the piece above about having the associations connected automatically for your? You don't have that with NoTracking, so if you load your data in multiple batches, you will not have a link to between them: ObjectQuery<Dog> oDogQuery = (ObjectQuery<Dog>)(from dog in YourContext.DogSet select dog); oDogQuery.MergeOption = MergeOption.NoTracking; List<Dog> dogs = oDogQuery.ToList(); ObjectQuery<Person> oPersonQuery = (ObjectQuery<Person>)(from o in YourContext.PersonSet select o); oPersonQuery.MergeOption = MergeOption.NoTracking; List<Person> owners = oPersonQuery.ToList(); In this case, no dog will have its .Owner property set. Some things to keep in mind when you are trying to optimize the performance. No lazy loading, what am I to do? This can be seen as a blessing in disguise. Of course it is annoying to load everything manually. However, it decreases the number of calls to the db and forces you to think about when you should load data. The more you can load in one database call the better. That was always true, but it is enforced now with this 'feature' of EF. Of course, you can call if( !ObjectReference.IsLoaded ) ObjectReference.Load(); if you want to, but a better practice is to force the framework to load the objects you know you will need in one shot. This is where the discussion about parametrized Includes begins to make sense. Lets say you have you Dog object public class Dog { public Dog Get(int id) { return YourContext.DogSet.FirstOrDefault(it => it.ID == id ); } } This is the type of function you work with all the time. It gets called from all over the place and once you have that Dog object, you will do very different things to it in different functions. First, it should be pre-compiled, because you will call that very often. Second, each different pages will want to have access to a different subset of the Dog data. Some will want the Owner, some the FavoriteToy, etc. Of course, you could call Load() for each reference you need anytime you need one. But that will generate a call to the database each time. Bad idea. So instead, each page will ask for the data it wants to see when it first request for the Dog object: static public Dog Get(int id) { return GetDog(entity,"");} static public Dog Get(int id, string includePath) { string query = "select value o " + " from YourEntities.DogSet as o " +

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  • Display empty textbox using Html.TextBoxFor on a not-null property in an EF entity.

    - by hungster
    I am using Entity Framework (v4) entities. I have an entity called Car with a Year property of type integer. The Year property does not allow NULL. I have the following in my Create view: <%= Html.TextBoxFor(model => model.Year) %> I am required to return a new Car object (due to other requirements) in my HttpGet Create action in the CarController. Currently, a zero is displayed in the Year textbox because the Year property does not allow NULL. I would like to display an empty textbox in the Create view. How do I do this?

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  • How do I achieve a 'select or insert' task using LINQ to EF?

    - by ProfK
    I have an import process with regions, locations, and shifts, where a Shift object has a Location property, and a Location object has a Region property. If a region name does not exist, I create the region, and like wise a location. I thought I could neatly encapsulate the 'Select if exists, or create' logic into helper classes for Region and Location, but if I use local data contexts in these classes I run into attach and detach overheads that become unpleasent. If I include a data context dependency in these classes, my encapsulation feels broken. What is the ideal method for achieving this, or where is the ideal place to place this functionality? In my example I have leaned heavily on the foreign key crutch provided with .NET 4.0, and simply avoided using entities in favour of direct foreign key values, but this is starting to smell. Example: public partial class ActivationLocation { public static int GetOrCreate(int regionId, string name) { using (var ents = new PvmmsEntities()) { var loc = ents.ActivationLocations.FirstOrDefault(x => x.RegionId == regionId && x.Name == name); if (loc == null) { loc = new ActivationLocation {RegionId = regionId, Name = name}; ents.AddToActivationLocations(loc); ents.SaveChanges(SaveOptions.AcceptAllChangesAfterSave); } return loc.LocationId; } } }

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  • Why does a newly created EF-entity throw an ID is null exception when trying to save?

    - by Richard
    I´m trying out entity framework included in VS2010 but ´ve hit a problem with my database/model generated from the graphical interface. When I do: user = dataset.UserSet.CreateObject(); user.Id = Guid.NewGuid(); dataset.UserSet.AddObject(user); dataset.SaveChanges(); {"Cannot insert the value NULL into column 'Id', table 'BarSoc2.dbo.UserSet'; column does not allow nulls. INSERT fails.\r\nThe statement has been terminated."} The table i´m inserting into looks like so: -- Creating table 'UserSet' CREATE TABLE [dbo].[UserSet] ( [Id] uniqueidentifier NOT NULL, [Name] nvarchar(max) NOT NULL, [Username] nvarchar(max) NOT NULL, [Password] nvarchar(max) NOT NULL ); GO -- Creating primary key on [Id] in table 'UserSet' ALTER TABLE [dbo].[UserSet] ADD CONSTRAINT [PK_UserSet] PRIMARY KEY CLUSTERED ([Id] ASC); GO Am I creating the object in the wrong way or doing something else basic wrong?

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  • Entity Framework - Why does EF use LEFT OUTER JOIN's in a 1-to-1 join?

    - by Taylor L
    Why does .NET Entity Framework produce SQL that uses a subquery and left outer join on a simple 1-to-1 relationship? I expected to see a simple join on the two tables. I'm using Devart Dotconnect for Oracle. Any ideas? Below is the output I see courtesy of the EFTracingProvider: SELECT 1 AS C1, "Join1".USER_ID1 AS USER_ID, ... FROM "MY$NAMESPACE".MYTABLE1 "Extent1" INNER JOIN (... FROM "MY$NAMESPACE".MYTABLE2 "Extent2" LEFT OUTER JOIN "MY$NAMESPACE".MYTABLE1 "Extent3" ON "Extent2".OTHER_ID = "Extent3".OTHER_ID ) "Join1" ON "Extent1".OTHER_ID = "Join1".OTHER_ID1 WHERE "Extent1".USER_ID = :EntityKeyValue1 -- EntityKeyValue1 (dbtype=String, size=6, direction=Input) = "000000"

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  • Entity Framework - Why does EF use LEFT OUTER JOIN's in a 1-to-1 relationship?

    - by Taylor L
    Why does .NET Entity Framework produce SQL that uses a subquery and left outer join on a simple 1-to-1 relationship? I expected to see a simple join on the two tables. I'm using Devart Dotconnect for Oracle. Any ideas? Below is the output I see courtesy of the EFTracingProvider: SELECT 1 AS C1, "Join1".USER_ID1 AS USER_ID, ... FROM "MY$NAMESPACE".MYTABLE1 "Extent1" INNER JOIN (... FROM "MY$NAMESPACE".MYTABLE2 "Extent2" LEFT OUTER JOIN "MY$NAMESPACE".MYTABLE1 "Extent3" ON "Extent2".OTHER_ID = "Extent3".OTHER_ID ) "Join1" ON "Extent1".OTHER_ID = "Join1".OTHER_ID1 WHERE "Extent1".USER_ID = :EntityKeyValue1 -- EntityKeyValue1 (dbtype=String, size=6, direction=Input) = "000000"

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  • How to leverage concurrency checking with EF 4.0 POCO Self Tracking Entities in a N-Tier scenario?

    - by Mark Lindell
    I'm using VS1010RC with the POCO self tracking T4 templates. In my WCF update service method I am using something similar to the following: using (var context = new MyContext()) { context.MyObjects.ApplyChanges(myObject); context.SaveChanges(); } This works fine until I set ConcurrencyMode=Fixed on the entity and then I get an exception. It appears as if the context does not know about the previous values as the SQL statement is using the changed entities value in the WHERE clause. What is the correct approach when using ConcurrencyMode=Fixed?

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  • How to add entity object to adequate entity set with object context in EF?

    - by Levelbit
    I have a problem when I add an entity object with ObjectContext.AddObject method because I can't retrieve that object with LINQ querying my ObjectContext.Person entities. I know that this new added object is stored somewhere, because it is used to update database after SaveChanges method. That's bothers me because I want to update my datagrid DataContext without saving changes unless I really want to do it. It doesn't help if I add the same object to DataContext list myself directly.

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  • Convert ADO.Net EF Connection String To Be SQL Azure Cloud Connection String Compatible!?

    - by Goober
    The Scenario I have written a Silverlight 3 Application that uses an SQL Server database. I'm moving the application onto the Cloud (Azure Platform). In order to do this I have had to setup my database on SQL Azure. I am using the ADO.Net Entity Framework to model my database. I have got the application running on the cloud, but I cannot get it to connect to the database. Below is the original localhost connection string, followed by the SQL Azure connection string that isn't working. The application itself runs fine, but fails when trying to retrieve data. The Original Localhost Connection String <add name="InmZenEntities" connectionString="metadata=res://*/InmZenModel.csdl|res://*/InmZenModel.ssdl|res://*/InmZenModel.msl; provider=System.Data.SqlClient; provider connection string=&quot; Data Source=localhost; Initial Catalog=InmarsatZenith; Integrated Security=True; MultipleActiveResultSets=True&quot;" providerName="System.Data.EntityClient" /> The Converted SQL Azure Connection String <add name="InmZenEntities" connectionString="metadata=res://*/InmZenModel.csdl|res://*/InmZenModel.ssdl|res://*/InmZenModel.msl; provider=System.Data.SqlClient; provider connection string=&quot; Server=tcp:MYSERVER.ctp.database.windows.net; Database=InmarsatZenith; UserID=MYUSERID;Password=MYPASSWORD; Trusted_Connection=False; MultipleActiveResultSets=True&quot;" providerName="System.Data.EntityClient" /> The Question Anyone know if this connection string for SQL Azure is correct? Help greatly appreciated.

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  • How to update non-scalar entity properties in EF 4.0?

    - by Mike
    At first I was using this as an extension method to update my detached entities... Public Sub AttachUpdated(ByVal obj As ObjectContext, ByVal objectDetached As EntityObject) If objectDetached.EntityState = EntityState.Detached Then Dim original As Object = Nothing If obj.TryGetObjectByKey(objectDetached.EntityKey, original) Then obj.ApplyCurrentValues(objectDetached.EntityKey.EntitySetName, objectDetached) Else Throw New ObjectNotFoundException() End If End If End Sub Everything has been working great until I had to update non-scalar properties. Correct me if I am wrong but that is because "ApplyCurrentValues" only supports scalars. To get around this I was just saving the FK_ID field instead of the entity object relation. Now I am faced with a many to many relationship so its not that simple. I would like to do something like this... Dim Resource = RelatedResource.GetByID(item.Value) Condition.RelatedResources.Add(Resource) But when I call SaveChanges the added Resources aren't saved. I started to play around with self-tracking entities (not sure if they will help solve my prob) but it seems they cannot be serialized to ViewState and this is a requirement for me. I guess one solution would be to add the xRef table as an entity and add the fks myself but I would rather it just work how I expect it too. I am open to any suggestions on how to either save my many to many relationships or serialize self-tracking entities (if self-trackingwould even solve my problem). Thanks!

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  • What is the best method for updating all changed data in EF 4?

    - by Soul_Master
    I try to create some method that can update any changed data from changed Data object (this object is generated by ASP.NET MVC) to old Data object (this object is retrieved from current data in DBMS) like the following code. public static bool UpdateSomeData(SomeEntities context, SomeModelType changedData) { var oldData = GetSomeModelTypeById(context, changedData.ID); UpdateModel(oldData, changedData); return context.SaveChanges() > 0; } I try to create method for saving any changed data without affects other unchanged data like the following source code. public static void UpdateModel<TModel>(TModel oldData, TModel changedData) { foreach (var pi in typeof(TModel).GetProperties() .Where ( // Ignore Change ID property for security reason x => x.Name.ToUpper() != "ID" && x.CanRead && x.CanWrite && ( // It must be primitive type or Guid x.PropertyType.FullName.StartsWith("System") && !x.PropertyType.FullName.StartsWith("System.Collection") && !x.PropertyType.FullName.StartsWith("System.Data.Entity.DynamicProxies") ) ) { var oldValue = pi.GetValue(oldData, null); var newValue = pi.GetValue(changedData, null); if (!oldValue.Equals(newValue)) { pi.SetValue(oldData, newValue, null); } } } I am not sure about the above method because it is so ugly method for updating data. From recent bug, it realizes me that if you update some property like Navigation Properties (related data from other table), it will remove current record from database. I don't understand why it happened. But it is very dangerous for me. So, do you have any idea for this question to ensure me about updating data from ASP.NET MVC? Thanks,

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  • where should I put the EF entity and data annotations in asp.net mvc + entity framework project

    - by giddy
    So I have a DataEntity class generated by EntityFramework4 for my sqlexpress08 database. This data context is exposed via a WCF Data Service/Odata to silverlight and win forms clients. Should the data entities + edmx file (generated by EF4) go in a separate class library? The problem here then is I would specify data annotations for a few entities and then some of them would require specific MVC attributes (like CompareAttribute) so the class library would also reference mvc dlls. There also happen to be entity users which will be encapsulated or wrapped into an IIdentity in the website. So its pretty tied to the mvc website. Or Should it maybe go in a Base folder in the mvc project itself? Mostly the website is data driven around the database, like approve users, change global settings etc. The real business happens in the silverlight and win forms apps. Im using mvc3 rc2 with Razor. Thanks

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  • EF 4 Self Tracking Entities does not work as expected.

    - by ashraf
    I am using EF4 Self Tracking Entities (VS2010 Beta 2 CTP 2 plus new T4 generator). But when I try to update entity information it does not update to database as expected. I setup 2 service calls. one for GetResource(int id) which return a resource object. the second call is SaveResource(Resource res); here is the code. public Resource GetResource(int id) { using (var dc = new MyEntities()) { return dc.Resources.Where(d => d.ResourceId == id).SingleOrDefault(); } } public void SaveResource(Resource res) { using (var dc = new MyEntities()) { dc.Resources.ApplyChanges(res); dc.SaveChanges(); // Nothing save to database. } } //Windows Console Client Calls var res = service.GetResource(1); res.Description = "New Change"; // Not updating... service.SaveResource(res); // does not change anything. It seems to me that ChangeTracker.State is always show as "Unchanged". anything wrong in this code?

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  • Howw to add new value with generic Repository if there are foreign keys (EF-4)?

    - by Phsika
    i try to write a kind of generic repository to add method. Everything is ok to add but I have table which is related with two tables with FOREIGN KEY.But Not working because of foreign key public class DomainRepository<TModel> : IDomainRepository<TModel> where TModel : class { #region IDomainRepository<T> Members private ObjectContext _context; private IObjectSet<TModel> _objectSet; public DomainRepository() { } public DomainRepository(ObjectContext context) { _context = context; _objectSet = _context.CreateObjectSet<TModel>(); } //do something..... public TModel Add<TModel>(TModel entity) where TModel : IEntityWithKey { EntityKey key; object originalItem; key = _context.CreateEntityKey(entity.GetType().Name, entity); _context.AddObject(key.EntitySetName, entity); _context.SaveChanges(); return entity; } //do something..... } Calling REPOSITORY: //insert-update-delete public partial class AddtoTables { public table3 Add(int TaskId, int RefAircraftsId) { using (DomainRepository<table3> repTask = new DomainRepository<table3>(new TaskEntities())) { return repTask.Add<table3>(new table3() { TaskId = TaskId, TaskRefAircraftsID = RefAircraftsId }); } } } How to add a new value if this table includes foreign key relation

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  • SQL Server 2008 EF 4 - limiting database records returned using permissions?

    - by Chuck
    In our database all tables are linked back to a single table. This table has a bit column to limit whether the record is displayed. Currently the records are filtered on the code side of the website. Is there any way to set up permission so that userA would never see any record in the database where that common bit column was set to true? We are using SQL Server 2008. Alternatively we are also using entity framework 4.0 in .net 4 (in c#) if you have any ideas how it might be accomplished there? Thanks for your feedback.

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