I am new to entity framework and I am trying to get my head around it. I am used to writing stored procedures which have all the data I need on a example by example basis.
I am under the impression that I can get all values from a particular table including the foreign key values direct using entity framework without having to write a select query which joins the data.
I have the following in my controller
public ActionResult Patient()
{
using (var context = new WaysToWellnessDB())
{
var patients = context.Patients.ToList();
return View(patients);
}
}
In my view I have the following
#foreach (var item in Model)
{
<p>
#item.FirstName #item.Surname #item.Gender.GenderDesc
</p>
}
I have two tables, Patient and Gender, GenderId is a foreign key which I am trying to get the GenderDesc from that table.
I am getting the following message
The ObjectContext instance has been disposed and can no longer be used for operations that require a connection.
Can someone explain why I cannot access GenderDesc. It does work if I remove the using() around my context, but I don't really want to leave that open, is there a way to get this to work still having the using around?
Thanks in advance.
Correct, you have disposed of the context as it is within a using statement, so anything you try to access from then on will not be able to be lazy loaded. The disadvantage with lazy loading is that it will perform a query for the gender for every patient you are iterating over, which is handy, but bad! I would load the related table at query time using Include.
You'll need a new import:
using System.Data.Entity;
And then include the related table:
var patients = context.Patients.Include(p => p.Gender).ToList();
That will result in a query which will join to your "Gender" table and you should be able to output item.Gender.GenderDesc in your view.
Related
I am working on an ASP.NET MVC 4 web application. I am using Entity Framework as the data access layer, using database first approach (.edmx file).
Currently I have a problem in join tables that are defined inside two different databases (i.e. I have two .edmx files).
For example if I want to join tables I am performing the following query:-
public ActionResult AutoComplete(string term)
{
var tech = repository.AllFindTechnolog(term).Take(100);//Call to the first database
var resources = repository.GetResources(tech.Select(a => a.IT360ID.Value).ToArray(), false);//call to the second database
var query = from techItems in tech
join resourcesItems in resources
on techItems.IT360ID.Value equals resourcesItems.RESOURCEID // join based on db2ID
orderby techItems.PartialTag
select new //code goes here
return Json(query, JsonRequestBehavior.AllowGet);
}
I will have two separate calls to the database, and a join inside the application server, which is not the best performance-oriented solution. Ideally the joins will happen completely inside the database engine.
I know that a stored procedure will allow me to join tables from different databases purely on the server, but I do not want to use SP because it will make my code less maintainable and less testable.
So I am searching for a solution where I can do the join using entity framework and to result in a single database join?
If you want to do it with a single database call you will have to create a View in the database that joins the 2 tables from separate db's. Once the view is created you can add it to EF as a single object, which you can manipulate further and Query off of. The view will basically be a table and it will be easily maintable and easy to bind to a strongly typed model
Another way ,similiar like you have posted, you can query separate .edmx files and then join them.
Yes, there is 2 calls to the database but it shouldn't be that expensive and probably won't notice a difference.
using(var db = new MyEntities())
using (var db2 = new MyEntities2())
{
var one = db.Table1.AsEnumerable();
var two = db2.Table2.AsEnumerable();
var result = from o in one
join t in two on o.Id equals t.Id
// blah blah
}
#CSharper's answer is close. As #Oliver mentioned in the comments, IEnumerable loads the table into application memory, leading to crashes if you have a large database.
The solution is to use IQueryable, which can be called with LINQ - this produces SQL which is much faster.
// This is a generic method, modify to your needs
public ActionResult Details(int? id)
var one = db.Table1.AsQueryable();
var two = db2.Table2.AsQueryable();
// since you're using MVC EF, I assume you want to put this in a viewmodel
// (in this case ObjectCombined)
// assume "id" is passed as parameter
Object1 result1 = (from o in one where one.id == id select o).Single();
Object2 result2 = (from t in two where t.id == o.id select t).Single();
ObjectCombined result = new ObjectCombined(result1, result2);
return View(result);
}
Might I suggest that you look into using a synonym in your database. For instance, you can create a synonym to the resources table in the database that your tech table is located. This will ensure that you will not need to maintain 2 EDMX files. Instead you can have a single EDMX file and you can simply join your tech table to the synonym of the resource table and voila - you are on your way.
UPDATE: Please note that if you are using synonyms there is an extra bit of work you will need to do to the EDMX file to get it working in Entity Framework. Here is a blog post that was put out by a programmer who got it to work. Here is the original stackoverflow question she asked.
HAPPY CODING!!! :)
you can create a view or a stored procedure, your sql statement can then make cross db query just make sure your credentials can DML or DDL on both db. otherwise try the nested using entities that will make sure you will not get the linq bug when you dont declare the db entity inside a using statement.
I am learning MVC4 in Visual Studio and I have many questions about it. My first statement about MVC is that MVC's Model doesnt do what I expected. I expect Model to select and return the data rows according to the needs.
But I read many tutorial and they suggest me to let Model return ALL the data from the table and then eliminate the ones I dont need in the controller, then send it to the View.
here is the code from tutorials
MODEL
public class ApartmentContext : DbContext
{
public ApartmentContext() : base("name=ApartmentContext") { }
public DbSet<Apartment> Apartments { get; set; }
}
CONTROLLER
public ActionResult Index()
{
ApartmentContext db = new ApartmentContext();
var apartments = db.Apartments.Where(a => a.no_of_rooms == 5);
return View(apartments);
}
Is this the correct way to apply "where clause" to a select statement? I dont want to select all the data and then eliminate the unwanted rows. This seems weird to me but everybody suggest this, at least the tutorials I read suggest this.
Well which ever tutorial you read that from is wrong (in my opinion). You shouldn't be returning actual entities to your view, you should be returning view models. Here's how I would re-write your example:
public class ApartmentViewModel
{
public int RoomCount { get; set; }
...
}
public ActionResult Index()
{
using (var db = new ApartmentContext())
{
var apartments = from a in db.Apartments
where a.no_of_rooms == 5
select new ApartmentViewModel()
{
RoomCount = a.no_of_rooms
...
};
return View(apartments.ToList());
}
}
Is this the correct way to apply "where clause" to a select statement?
Yes, this way is fine. However, you need to understand what's actually happening when you call Where (and various other LINQ commands) on IQueryable<T>. I assume you are using EF and as such the Where query would not execute immediately (as EF uses delayed execution). So basically you are passing your view a query which has yet to be run and only at the point of where the view attempts to render the data is when the query will run - by which time your ApartmentContext will have been disposed and as a result throw an exception.
db.Apartments.Where(...).ToList();
This causes the query to execute immediately and means your query no longer relys on the context. However, it's still not the correct thing to do in MVC, the example I have provided is considered the recommended approach.
In our project, we will add a Data Access Layer instead of accessing Domain in controller. And return view model instead of Domain.
But your code, you only select the data you need not all the data.
If you open SQL Profiler you'll see that's a select statement with a where condition.
So if it's not a big project I think it's OK.
I can't see these tutorials but are you sure it's loading all the data? It looks like your using entity framework and entity framework uses Lazy laoding. And Lazy loading states:
With lazy loading enabled, related objects are loaded when they are
accessed through a navigation property.
So it might appear that your loading all the data but the data itself is only retrieved from SQL when you access the object itself.
Getting an error client side with breeze: "Cannot call method 'map' of undefined" when trying to pull over some data. The difference between this action and one that works is that this action is calling a stored procedure and returning ObjectResult<T> instead of DbSet<T>.
Might this be why I get an error? Using Chrome Developer tools, I do see that the breeze controller is returning json data.
I have created a complex model type in the edmx for mapping the rows returned from the stored procedure.
The action in the breeze controller has a return type of IEnumerable<T>.
I experienced the same error when using an EF complex type. A workaround was to create a view in my database instead of using a complex type, set the stored procedure to return a type of the new view which had a primary key and then it worked. It would seem that breeze requires entities to have a primary key defined.
Hm... not quite sure what is happening, so just guessing here, but try adding an AsQueryable() to the result returned, and changing the result type to a IQueryable.
We don't have any stored proc tests for breeze yet, but this is impetus for me to add some :)
I had the very same issue, but thank God I figured out a solution. Instead of using a stored procedure, you should use a view, as Breeze recognizes views as DbSet<T>, just like tables. Say you have a SQL server table that contains two tables Customers and Orders.
Customers (**CustomerId**, FirstName, LastName)
Orders (OrderId, #CustomerId, OrderDate, OrderTotal)
Now, say you want a query that returns orders by CustomerId. Usually, you would do that in a stored procedure, but as I said, you need to use a view instead. So the query will look like this in the view.
Select o.OrderId, c.CustomerId, o.OrderDate, o.OrderTotal
from dbo.Orders o inner join dbo.Customers c on c.CustomerId = o.CustomerId
Notice there is no filtering (where ...). So:
i. Create a [general] view that includes the filtering key(s) and name it, say, OrdersByCustomers
ii. Add the OrdersByCustomers view to the entity model in your VS project
iii. Add the entity to the Breeze controller, as such:
public IQueryable<OrdersByCustomers> OrdersByCustomerId(int id)
{
return _contextProvider.Context.OrdersByCustomers
.Where(r => r.CustomerId == id);
}
Notice the .Where(r => r.CustomerId == id) filter. We could do it in the data service file, but because we want the user to see only his personal data, we need to filter from the server so it only returns his data.
iv. Now, that the entity is set in the controller, you may invoke it in the data service file, as such:
var getOrdersByCustomerId = function(orderObservable, id)
{
var query = breeze.EntityQuery.from('OrdersByCustomerId')
.WithParameters({ CustomerId: id });
return manager.executeQuery(query)
.then(function(data) {
if (orderObservable) orderObservable(data.results);
}
.fail(function(e) {
logError('Retrieve Data Failed');
}
}
v. You probably know what to do next from here.
Hope it helps.
I have an ASP.NET MVC website. In my backend I have a table called People with the following columns:
ID
Name
Age
Location
... (a number of other cols)
I have a generic web page that uses model binding to query this data. Here is my controller action:
public ActionResult GetData(FilterParams filterParams)
{
return View(_dataAccess.Retrieve(filterParams.Name, filterParams.Age, filterParams.location, . . .)
}
which maps onto something like this:
http://www.mysite.com/MyController/GetData?Name=Bill .. .
The dataAccess layer simply checks each parameter to see if its populated to add to the db where clause. This works great.
I now want to be able to store a user's filtered queries and I am trying to figure out the best way to store a specific filter. As some of the filters only have one param in the queryString while others have 10+ fields in the filter I can't figure out the most elegant way to storing this query "filter info" into my database.
Options I can think of are:
Have a complete replicate of the table (with some extra cols) but call it PeopleFilterQueries and populate in each record a FilterName and put the value of the filter in each of field (Name, etc)
Store a table with just FilterName and a string where I store the actual querystring Name=Bill&Location=NewYork. This way I won't have to keep adding new columns if the filters change or grow.
What is the best practice for this situation?
If the purpose is to save a list of recently used filters, I would serialise the complete FilterParams object into an XML field/column after the model binding has occurred. By saving it into a XML field you're also giving yourself the flexibility to use XQuery and DML should the need arise at a later date for more performance focused querying of the information.
public ActionResult GetData(FilterParams filterParams)
{
// Peform action to get the information from your data access layer here
var someData = _dataAccess.Retrieve(filterParams.Name, filterParams.Age, filterParams.location, . . .);
// Save the search that was used to retrieve later here
_dataAccess.SaveFilter(filterParams);
return View(someData);
}
And then in your DataAccess Class you'll want to have two Methods, one for saving and one for retrieving the filters:
public void SaveFilter(FilterParams filterParams){
var ser = new System.Xml.Serialization.XmlSerializer(typeof(FilterParams));
using (var stream = new StringWriter())
{
// serialise to the stream
ser.Serialize(stream, filterParams);
}
//Add new database entry here, with a serialised string created from the FilterParams obj
someDBClass.SaveFilterToDB(stream.ToString());
}
Then when you want to retrieve a saved filter, perhaps by Id:
public FilterParams GetFilter(int filterId){
//Get the XML blob from your database as a string
string filter = someDBClass.GetFilterAsString(filterId);
var ser = new System.Xml.Serialization.XmlSerializer(typeof(FilterParams));
using (var sr = new StringReader(filterParams))
{
return (FilterParams)ser.Deserialize(sr);
}
}
Remember that your FilterParams class must have a default (i.e. parameterless) constructor, and you can use the [XmlIgnore] attribute to prevent properties from being serialised into the database should you wish.
public class FilterParams{
public string Name {get;set;}
public string Age {get;set;}
[XmlIgnore]
public string PropertyYouDontWantToSerialise {get;set;}
}
Note: The SaveFilter returns Void and there is no error handling for brevity.
Rather than storing the querystring, I would serialize the FilterParams object as JSON/XML and store the result in your database.
Here's a JSON Serializer I regularly use:
using System.IO;
using System.Runtime.Serialization.Json;
using System.Text;
namespace Fabrik.Abstractions.Serialization
{
public class JsonSerializer : ISerializer<string>
{
public string Serialize<TObject>(TObject #object) {
var dc = new DataContractJsonSerializer(typeof(TObject));
using (var ms = new MemoryStream())
{
dc.WriteObject(ms, #object);
return Encoding.UTF8.GetString(ms.ToArray());
}
}
public TObject Deserialize<TObject>(string serialized) {
var dc = new DataContractJsonSerializer(typeof(TObject));
using (var ms = new MemoryStream(Encoding.UTF8.GetBytes(serialized)))
{
return (TObject)dc.ReadObject(ms);
}
}
}
}
You can then deserialize the object and pass it your data access code as per your example above.
You didn't mention about exact purpose of storing the filter.
If you insist to save filter into a database table, I would have following structure of the table.
FilterId
Field
FieldValue
An example table might be
FilterId Field FieldValue
1 Name Tom
1 Age 24
1 Location IL
3 Name Mike
...
The answer is much more simple than you are making it:
Essentially you should store the raw query in its own table and relate it to your People table. Don't bother storing individual filter options.
Decide on a value to store (2 options)
Store the URL Query String
This id be beneficial if you like open API-style apps, and want something you can pass nicely back and forth from the client to the server and re-use without transformation.
Serialize the Filter object as a string
This is a really nice approach if your purpose for storing these filters remains entirely server side, and you would like to keep the data closer to a class object.
Relate your People table to your Query Filters Table:
The best strategy here depends on what your intention and performance needs are. Some suggestions below:
Simple filtering (ex. 2-3 filters, 3-4 options each)
Use Many-To-Many because the number of combinations suggests that the same filter combos will be used lots of times by lots of people.
Complex filtering
Use One-To-Many as there are so many possible individual queries, it less likely they are to be reused often enough to make the extra-normalization and performance hit worth your while.
There are certainly other options but they would depend on more detailed nuances of your application. The suggestions above would work nicely if you are say, trying to keep track of "recent queries" for a user, or "user favorite" filtering options...
Personal opinion
Without knowing much more about your app, I would say (1) store the query string, and (2) use OTM related tables... if and when your app shows a need for further performance profiling or issues with refactoring filter params, then come back... but chances are, it wont.
GL.
In my opinion the best way to save the "Filter" is to have some kind of json text string with each of the "columns names"
So you will have something in the db like
Table Filters
FilterId = 5 ; FilterParams = {'age' : '>18' , ...
Json will provide a lot of capabilities, like the use of age as an array to have more than one filter to the same "column", etc.
Also json is some kind of standard, so you can use this "filters" with other db some day or to just "display" the filter or edit it in a web form. If you save the Query you will be attached to it.
Well, hope it helps!
Assuming that a nosql/object database such as Berkeley DB is out of the question, I would definitely go with option 1. Sooner or later you'll find the following requirements or others coming up:
Allow people to save their filters, label, tag, search and share them via bookmarks, tweets or whatever.
Change what a parameter means or what it does, which will require you to version your filters for backward compatibility.
Provide auto-complete functions over filters, possibly using a user's filter history to inform the auto-complete.
The above will be somewhat harder to satisfy if you do any kind of binary/string serialization where you'll need to parse the result and then process them.
If you can use a NoSql DB, then you'll get all the benefits of a sql store plus be able to model the 'arbitrary number of key/value pairs' very well.
Have thought about using Profiles. This is a build in mechanism to store user specific info. From your description of your problem its seems a fit.
Profiles In ASP.NET 2.0
I have to admit that M$ implementation is a bit dated but there is essentially nothing wrong with the approach. If you wanted to roll your own, there's quite a bit of good thinking in their API.
I have a simple form which inserts a new Category with the given parentID (ServiceID).
and my parent child relationship is this;
Service > Category
my url for creating a Category based on the ServiceId is this
/Admin/Categories/Create/3 => "3 is the serviceID"
and my Action method is this
[AcceptVerbs(HttpVerbs.Post)]
public ActionResult Create(int? id, Category category)
{
if (ModelState.IsValid)
{
try
{
category.Service = dbService.GetAll().WithServiceId(id.Value).SingleOrDefault();
dbCategory.Add(category);
dbCategory.Save();
return RedirectToRoute("List_Categories", new { ServiceId = id.Value });
}
catch
{
ModelState.AddRuleViolation(category.GetRuleViolations());
}
}
return
View ....
I am using LinqToSql for db actions. Anyway the strange part begins here.
When i save the data it inserts a data to Service table instead of insterting data just to Category Table and the data which is inserted to Category Table has the new inserted ServiceID.
Is it a problem with the ASP.NET MVC ModelBinder or am i doing a mistake that i dont see ?
I have used LinqToSql in several projects and have never had an issue like this
It could be an error in your LINQ To SQL set up. Is the service id an autogenerated field in the DB -- is it marked as such in the LINQ to SQL classes? Does your service disconnect it from the data context, then not reattach it before submitting? If so, have you tried adding the category to the service and then saving the updated service?
var service = ...
service.Categories.Add(category);
service.Save();
Where does your Category object come from? As I see you are relying on ASP.NET MVC Model binding for providing it but for that you need a form somewhere to make a POST. It would help to see the form too.
Also personally I rather use FormCollection (rather than business model classes) in my action signatures and then pull the posted data out from the FormCollection by myself. Coz sooner or later you end up having some complex objects with various one-to-many, many-to-many relationships that Model Binding just won't pick up and you have to construct it by yourself.