ASP.NET MVC & AutoMapper (Populate View Model from Parent & Child Domain Objects) - asp.net

Question

I have following doimain objects:
public class ComponentType
{
public int ComponentTypeID { get; set; }
public string Component_Type { get; set; }
public string ComponentDesc { get; set; }
}
public class AffiliateComponentType
{
public int AffiliateComponentID { get; set; }
public int AffiliateID { get; set; }
public ComponentType ComponentType { get; set; }
public bool MandatoryComponent { get; set; }
public bool CanBeBookedStandalone { get; set; }
public int PreferenceOrder { get; set; }
}
I will get a LIST of AffiliateComponentType from DB using NHibernate. Now I have to populate a LIST of AffiliateComponentTypeView (View Model) from LIST of AffiliateComponentType domain object. How can I achieve this using AutoMapper?
[Serializable]
public class AffiliateComponentTypeView
{
public int ComponentTypeID { get; set; }
public string Component_Type { get; set; }
public string ComponentDesc { get; set; }
public bool MandatoryComponent { get; set; }
public bool CanBeBookedStandalone { get; set; }
public int PreferenceOrder { get; set; }
}

Answer 1

The following mapping should do the job of flattening your model:
Mapper
.CreateMap<AffiliateComponentType, AffiliateComponentTypeView>()
.ForMember(
dest => dest.ComponentTypeID,
opt => opt.MapFrom(src => src.ComponentType.ComponentTypeID)
)
.ForMember(
dest => dest.Component_Type,
opt => opt.MapFrom(src => src.ComponentType.Component_Type)
)
.ForMember(
dest => dest.ComponentDesc,
opt => opt.MapFrom(src => src.ComponentType.ComponentDesc)
);
and if you modified your view model like this:
[Serializable]
public class AffiliateComponentTypeView
{
public int ComponentTypeComponentTypeID { get; set; }
public string ComponentTypeComponent_Type { get; set; }
public string ComponentTypeComponentDesc { get; set; }
public bool MandatoryComponent { get; set; }
public bool CanBeBookedStandalone { get; set; }
public int PreferenceOrder { get; set; }
}
The flattening will be performed automatically by AutoMapper using standard conventions so all you need is:
Mapper.CreateMap<AffiliateComponentType, AffiliateComponentTypeView>();
There will just be a slight problem with the Component_Type property as it clashes with AutoMapper's default naming convention so you might need to rename it.
Once you have the mapping defined you could map:
IEnumerable<AffiliateComponentType> source = ...
IEnumerable<AffiliateComponentTypeView> dest = Mapper.Map<IEnumerable<AffiliateComponentType>, IEnumerable<AffiliateComponentTypeView>>(source);

Answer 2

Somewhere in your app, you'll have a block of code that configures AutoMapper, so I'm guessing you'd have a block that looks like so:
Mapper.CreateMap<ComponentType, AffiliateComponentTypeView>();
Mapper.CreateMap<AffiliateComponentType, AffiliateComponentTypeView>();
Then, once you have your model back from nHibernate, you'll construct your view model like so:
var model = Session.Load<AffiliateComponentType>(id);
var viewModel = Mapper.Map<AffiliateComponentType,
AffiliateComponentTypeView>(model);
if (model.ComponentType != null)
Mapper.Map(model.ComponentType, viewModel);
Hope this gets you where you're headed!