I am trying to use the DbEntityEntry.CurrentValues.SetValues() method to facilitate updating an existing entity with values from a non-entity DTO (see: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/adonet/archive/2011/01/30/using-dbcontext-in-ef-feature-ctp5-part-5-working-with-property-values.aspx)
I'm having trouble removing the dependency on DbEntityEntry though (for mocking, testing). Here is an example of what I would like to do:
var entity = dbSet.Find(dto.Id);
var entry = context.Entry(entity);
entry.CurrentValues.SetValues(dto);
context.SaveChanges();
I've also considered:
EntityType entity = new EntityType() { Id = dto.Id };
context.Attach(entity);
var entry = context.Entry(entity);
entry.CurrentValues.SetValues(entity);
context.SaveChanges();
From what I've been able to find both seem reasonable when working with an actual DbContext, but when I abstract the context to an IMyContext I lose the capability to get a DbEntityEntry for an entity, thus losing the SetValues option.
Is there any way to work around this issue, or do I need to bite the bullet and manually set modified properties on the entity from the DTO (potentially a lot of boilerplate for entities with many properties)?
(I'm fairly new to EF and this is my first StackOverflow question, so please be gentle)
If you have never used it before, this would be a great use for AutoMapper (also available via NuGet). I am unaware of how to solve your IMyContext issue and would also resort to mapping the properties. But instead of doing so manually, I would allow AutoMapper to do the heavy lifting.
Related
I'm trying to find the vocabulary to describe what I want and if it exists.
I have a table that shows a few data points from large objects. Loading the entire objects just for the table is very slow. Is there a way to only pass to the front the few properties I want without having to define a new object?
I found something called Sparse Fieldsets in JSON API, and I'm wondering if something like this exists for .NET under another name.
Update:
Talking to another coder, I realize it probably makes more sense to implement something like this between the backend and the database and make a specific call for this table. I still need to work out if I need to create a new object to support this. I think it'd still be faster if I just kept the same object but nulled out all of the connecting objects that I don't need for the table. But maybe that's considered bad practice? Also we're using Entity Framework for what it's worth.
Update 2:
I just created a new query without all of the .Include() and works well enough for what I need:
_dataContext.ApplePie
.Include(f => f.Apples).ThenInclude(f => f.Apple)
.Include(f => f.Sugars).ThenInclude(f => f.MolecularStructure)
.Include(f => f.Recipe)
Maybe you are looking for Anonymous Types?
For example, if you had a typed object with three properties, but you only wanted to operate on two:
var threePropThing = new ThreePropertyThing { Id = 1, Message = "test", ExtraProperty = "ex" };
var myAnonThing = new { Id = threePropThing.Id, Message = threePropThing.Message };
Best practice would be to not pass this anonymous object around. But, if you really needed to, you could return it as type object.
Typically, when passing data around in c#, you want to have it typed.
C# is a strongly-typed language and I would say that it is unusual for C# to support scenarios, when object definition (properties) are not known in advance, like in JSON API "fields" parameter case. Implementing this would imply using reflection to filter the properties, which is usually slow and error-prone.
When implementing C# web-services, people usually create one DTO response model per each request.
If your table has fixed set of fields, I would personally recommend to create a DTO class containing only the fields which are required for your table, and then create a method which returns this response for your specific request. While it doesn't align with "without having to define a new object" in the question, it makes the intention clear and makes it really easier to maintain the API in future.
You might want to use libraries like AutoMapper to save time and avoid duplicated code of copying the values from data model to DTO, if you have many such methods.
I'm fairly new to asp.net mvc, so please bear with me.
I want to implement a calendar functionality, and all the tutorials I've looked at use database-first approach and have the edmx file (Entity Data Model)
I'm using code first and what can I do regarding the code that references this edmx file? do I reference context instead?
example:
public JsonResult GetEvents()
{
//Here MyDatabaseEntities is our entity datacontext (see Step 4)
using (MyDatabaseEntities dc = new MyDatabaseEntities())
{
var v = dc.Events.OrderBy(a => a.StartAt).ToList();
return new JsonResult { Data = v, JsonRequestBehavior = JsonRequestBehavior.AllowGet };
}
}
Sorry if this question is vague or not clear.
Thank you and I'd appreciate help!
In code first, you don't need an edmx file, because everything is in your own code. The basic building blocks are:
A class that inherits from DbContext. This will be equivalent to the MyDatabaseEntities class in your sample.
A set of entity classes. They basically just need to be plain classes with auto properties corresponding to your database columns. For built in conventions to work, you also need an ID, for instance an int property named Id
A set of properties on your DbContext class of type DbSet for every type T which is an entity you would like to query against. This is the Events property in your example.
In more advanced scenarios you customize the mappings beyond what the conventions can infer automatically. This can be done with attributes on your entity classes, or via a special set of APIs that can be called on your context at startup
Go to Sql server inside your database there is a folder Database Diagram, Right click New Database Diagram and explore it.
As those of you working with Entity Framework Core may know, the current version does not have an implementation for CurrentValues.SetValues() for Entities. It looks like support for this will come in the next release v1.1 as this issue states. Until then, does anybody have a solution that works for updating entity entries?
For context, the SetValues function in the past entity framework takes an entity and updates it properties to the values of an entity passed as a parameter i.e.:
var updatedEntity = currentEntity.CurrentValues.SetValues(newValues);
_dbContext.SaveChanges();
I've found some implementations using PropertyInfo to make a generic update function but haven't found anything that looks to be a nice clean solution. Might just have to take what I can get though :)
p.s. I realize this function only worked for simple entities that don't have complex object graphs that would require updating other related entities. My use case is simple. It's just annoying to have to manually map properties right now.
EDIT: Now that EF Core v1.1.0 has been released, CurrentValues.SetValues() will work.
See the following code snippet
var currentEntity = dbSetEntity.Find(id);
_dbContext.Entry(currentEntity).CurrentValues.SetValues(newValues);
I have some personal data structure mixed with "standard fields". I would like to avoid the manual work on simple fields (with datastore native API):
toPersist.setProperty("field1", value1);
toPersist.setUnindexedProperty("field2", value2);
but I still want to get the prefilled Entity instance toPersist so I can add my own #Ignore fields my self
For example:
Entity filled = OfyService.ofy().save().entity(this).fill();
filled.setProperty("mySpecialField", jsonValue);
//...
// I want to save my entities alone
datastore.put( filled );
reversely I'd like to get the Entity object representing each entry in a load() call.
Is this possible? or do I have to dive into Objectify code to hack it?
thanks for your answers
I don't follow your question exactly, but I'm pretty sure what you're looking for are the #OnLoad and #OnSave annotations. You add them to methods within your entity classes, and those methods will be called just after an entity is loaded, or just before one is saved, respectively. The documentation for them is here.
Edit:
After your comments (below) I now understand what you are trying to accomplish. Yes, Objectify supports this (though I have never tried it myself). You want to use the Saver.toEntity() and Loader.fromEntity() methods. It appears you can use them like this:
// Use Objectify to convert a POJO into an Entity
Entity filled = ofy().save().toEntity(myPojo);
// Use Objectify to convert an Entity into a POJO
Object pojoCopy = ofy().load().fromEntity(filled);
I'm working on a site and there are two projects in the solution a business logic project and the website project. I understand that I want to keep the entity context out of the web project and only use the business objects the framework creates but I can't figure out how to save a modified object this way.
Let's say my entity model created this class:
public class Person //Person entity
{
Int32 Id {get;set;}
String Name {get;set;}
Address Address {get;set;} //Address entity
}
And I created this class to get a specific person:
public static class PersonController
{
public static Person GetById(int id)
{
using (Entities context = new Entities())
{
return context.Persons.FirstOrDefault(x => x.Id == id);
}
}
}
This allows me to get a person without a context by calling PersonController.GetById(1); and I can change the persons properties after I get them but I can't figure out how to save the modified information back to the database. Ideally I would like to partial class Person and add a .Save() method which would handle creating a context adding the person to it and saving the changes. But when I tried this a while ago there were all kinds of issues with it still being attached to the old context and even if I detatch it and attatch it to a new context it gets attached as EntityState.Unchanged, if I remember right, so when I call context.SaveChages() after attaching it nothing actually gets updated.
I guess I have two questions:
1) Am I going about this in a good way/is there a better way? If I'm doing this in a really terrible way I would appreciate some psudo-code to point me in the right direction; a link to a post explaining how to go about this type of thing would work just as well.
2) Can someone provide some psudo-code for a save method? The save method would also need to handle if an address was attached or removed.
There are many ways to handle Entity Framework as a persistence layer.
For one, it looks like you're not using pure POCOs. That is, you let EF generate the classes for your (in the EDMX.designer.cs file).
Nothing wrong with that, but it does inhibit a clean separation of concerns (especially when it comes to unit testing).
Have you considering implementing the Repository pattern to encapsulate your EF logic? This would be a good way to isolate the logic from your UI.
In terms of Save - this is where it gets difficult. You're right, most people use partial classes. Generally, you would have a base class which exposes a virtual "Save" method, which the partial classes can then override.
I personally don't like this pattern - i believe POCOs should not care about persistence, or the underlying infrastructure. Therefore I like to use pure POCOs (no code gen), Repository pattern and Unit of Work.
The Unit of Work handles the context opening/saving/closing for you.
This is how (my) Unit of Work does the magic. Consider this some code in your "Web" project:
var uOw = new UnitOfWork(); // this is class i created, implementing the UOW pattern
var person = repository.Find(10); // find's a "Person" entity (pure POCO), with id 10.
person.Name = "Scott";
uOw.Commit();
Or adding a new Person:
var uOw = new UnitOfWork();
var newPerson = new Person { Name = "Bob" };
repository.Add(newPerson);
uOw.Commit();
How nice is that? :)
Line 1 creates a new sql context for you.
Line 2 uses that same context to retrieve a single "Person" object, which is a hand-coded POCO (not generated by EF).
Line 3 changes the name of the Person (pure POCO setter).
Line 4 Saves the changes to the data context, and closes the context.
Now, there is a LOT more to these patterns than that, so I suggest you read up on these patterns to see if it suits you.
My repository is also implemented with Generics, so I can re-use this interface for all business entity persistence.
Also take a look at some of the other questions I have asked on Stack Overflow - and you can see how I've implemented these patterns.
Not sure if this is the "answer" you're looking for, but thought I'd give you some alternative options.