Updating Record EF not working - entity-framework

Why is this not updating in the database, but the commented out version does work?
public bool InsertOrUpdateItems(Items item)
{
using (var dbContext = new MyEntities())
{
var items = dbContext.Items.Find(item.ItemId);
if (items != null)
{
dbContext.Items.Attach(items);
dbContext.Entry(items).State = EntityState.Modified;
//dbContext.Entry(items).CurrentValues.SetValues(item);
dbContext.SaveChanges();
}
There are no exceptions being thrown, it just wont update. Even though the record is found.

If the line in question is commented out, there are no new values to update. Notice that you:
Get object named items from DB
You attach it (although it is attached by default)
You try to save the same items
Object that you pass as a parameter for InsertOrUpdateItems method (item) is not even touched in your code, except reading its Id for use with Find()

Related

Update method throws an exception, because the entity is already tracked

I have a problem with EF Core 5 that is really getting me down.
FYI, LazyLoadingProxies are used (something else that just gives me a headache, but well, different topic).
Information for the code below:
Service: A service per entity, contains all CRUD operations into the database and other methods if needed.
Workflow: Uses multiple services at once to perform certain operations (e.g. create product -> create product folder -> save product).
Problem:
I have an entity "Product" which contains the following update method which is used to update the properties of the entity with those of another object:
public override void Update(Product source)
{
// Properties
AnnualPrice = source.AnnualPrice;
...
// Relations
var sourceRelatedProductIds = source.RelatedWithProductIds.Where(x => x != Id);
if (sourceRelatedProductIds.Count() != 0)
{
RelatedWithProducts.Clear();
foreach (var relatedWithProduct in ctx.Set<Product>().Where(x => source.RelatedWithProductIds.Contains(x.Id)).AsNoTracking())
{
RelatedWithProducts.Add(relatedWithProduct);
}
}
var oldShortDescriptions = ShortDescriptions.ToList(); <--- EXCEPTION
ShortDescriptions.Clear();
foreach (var shortDescription in source.ShortDescriptions)
{
shortDescription.Id = oldShortDescriptions.FirstOrDefault(x => x.Culture == shortDescription.Culture)?.Id ?? 0;
ShortDescriptions.Add(shortDescription);
}
...
}
In the line with the arrow and "Exception", I get the following exception:
System.InvalidOperationException: 'The instance of entity type 'Product' cannot be tracked because another instance with the key value '{Id: 1}' is already being tracked. When attaching existing entities, ensure that only one entity instance with a given key value is attached.'
In itself, I understand what the exception is trying to tell me. My problem is that I can't find the reason for it anywhere. Because as far as I can tell, the product with ID 1 can't be tracked yet.
Of course, the problem is not in the update method, but before it, so here is the rest of the code.
ProductController.Update:
[HttpPut("update")]
public IActionResult Update(C.Product[] products)
{
if (!ModelState.IsValid)
{
return UnprocessableEntity(ModelState.Values.SelectMany(x => x.Errors));
}
var dbProducts = products.Select(ToDatabase).ToArray(); <--- Just converts the given client model into a Database model
var result = productWorkflow.Update(dbProducts); <--- Calls a workflow class, NOT the update method of the entity
return CoreToActionResultConverter.ToActionResult<Db.Product>(result);
}
ProductWorkflow.Update:
public ResultBase Update(params Product[] products)
{
var result = productService.AddOrUpdate(products); <--- This calls the Service CRUD AddOrUpdate method
if (result is not ServiceResult<Product>)
{
return result;
}
return new ServiceResult<Product>(ResultType.AddedOrUpdated);
}
ProductService.AddOrUpdate:
public virtual ResultBase AddOrUpdate(IEnumerable<TEntity> entities)
{
var currentEntities = new List<TEntity>();
foreach (var entity in entities)
{
var currentEntity = Get(entity.Id); <--- This line is the only one where I could imagine that it is already tracked here. The problem is only that it does not work ONLY with the workflow. If I call my AddOrUpdate method from the controller, which directly calls THIS method, it works (although this line is just executed the same way).
if (currentEntity == null)
{
currentEntity = Ctx.CreateProxy<TEntity>();
Ctx.Attach(currentEntity);
}
if (currentEntity != entity)
{
currentEntity.Update(entity);
}
currentEntities.Add(currentEntity);
}
Ctx.AddRange(currentEntities.Where(x => x.Id == 0));
Ctx.UpdateRange(currentEntities.Where(x => x.Id != 0));
try
{
Ctx.SaveChanges();
}
catch (DbUpdateException ex)
{
// Commented out the error handling to remove unnecessary things for the post
}
return new ServiceResult<TEntity>(ServiceResult.ResultType.AddedOrUpdated, currentEntities);
}
I found the problem and it was not on the line where the exception was thrown, but before.
In my Product.Update() method (the first code snippet), I get the Related Products by ID and add them to the list (Simply a Many to Many relationship, from Product <--> Product). When calling Update, I specified ID 1 in the RelatedProductIds, however the entity itself also has ID 1, so it references itself. I have now just fixed that by omitting the ID, if the same as the object itself.
This still doesn't explain why it works with a breakpoint, because it's still tracked in that case (or not tracked, since I'm using AsNoTracking(), but good).

EntityEntry.OriginalValues.ToObject() is the same as EntityEntry.Entity

I simply try to update an entity with method ProjeleriGuncelle below.
When I try to access the original values of the object in an overridden SaveChangesAsync with EntityEntry.OriginalValues.ToObject(), I see that the object contains the current values instead of the old ones.
Am I missing something? I expect clonedTypedEntity to have the values before update.
public async Task<ActionResult<int>> ProjeleriGuncelle(Proje proje)
{
var projeFound = DataContext.Projeler.AsNoTracking().FirstOrDefault(p => p.EntegrasyonId == proje.EntegrasyonId);
var entry = DataContext.Entry<Proje>(projeFound);
//Database entry is updated with the proje object as expected
entry.CurrentValues.SetValues(proje);
entry.State = EntityState.Modified;
await DataContext.SaveChangesAsync();
}
public override Task<int> SaveChangesAsync(CancellationToken cancellationToken = new CancellationToken())
{
ChangeTracker.DetectChanges();
var modifiedEntries = this.ChangeTracker.Entries();
foreach (var modifiedEntry in modifiedEntries)
{
//modifiedEntry.OriginalValues.ToObject() returns the object with the currrent values instead of the original values before update
if (modifiedEntry.OriginalValues.ToObject() is not IVersionable clonedTypedEntity) continue;
clonedTypedEntity.Id = 0;
clonedTypedEntity.UstSurumId = (modifiedEntry.Entity as IVersionable)?.Id;
Add(clonedTypedEntity);
}
return base.SaveChangesAsync(cancellationToken);
}
Update :
When I remove AsNoTracking() when querying for projeFound, modifiedEntry.OriginalValues.ToObject() really returns values before update. But I don't understand the behaviour, because with var entry = DataContext.Entry<Proje>(projeFound); statement, I expect that entry object is tracked, and by updating it with entry.CurrentValues.SetValues(proje); I expect to have access to original values.
For EF the original values are the values when it starts tracking, which is when entry.State = EntityState.Modified; is called. EF is oblivious of the changes that happened in the previous line of code.
You could solve it by swapping both lines:
entry.State = EntityState.Modified; // attaches and stores original values
entry.CurrentValues.SetValues(proje);
An improvement would be to attach the entry and let the change tracker figure out if the entity was really modified.
entry.State = EntityState.Unchanged; // attaches and stores original values
entry.CurrentValues.SetValues(proje);
Now SetValues only marks actually changed properties as modified and the update statement can be much slimmer, or even not happen at all.
I had the same problem in this days....
In my Dbcontext i set this property:
ChangeTracker.QueryTrackingBehavior = QueryTrackingBehavior.NoTracking;
this property disable all tracking and you can not have their OriginalValue.

EF Core 2.0: How to discover the exact object, in object graph, causing error in a insert operation?

I have a complex and big object graph that I want to insert in database by using a DbContext and SaveChanges method.
This object is a result of parsing a text file with 40k lines (around 3MB of data). Some collections inside this object have thousands of items.
I am able to parse the file correctly and add it to the context so that it can start tracking the object. But when I try to SaveChanges, it says:
Microsoft.EntityFrameworkCore.DbUpdateException: An error occurred while updating the entries. See the inner exception for details. ---> System.Data.SqlClient.SqlException: String or binary data would be truncated.
I would like to know if there is a smart and efficient way of discovering which object is causing the issue. It seems that a varchar field is too little to store the data. But it's a lot of tables and fields to check manually.
I would like to get a more specific error somehow. I already configured an ILoggerProvider and added the EnableSensitiveDataLogging option in my dbContext to be able to see which sql queries are being generated. I even added MiniProfiler to be able to see the parameter values, because they are not present in the log generated by the dbContext.
Reading somewhere in the web, I found out that in EF6 there is some validation that happens before the sql is passed to the database to be executed. But it seems that in EF Core this is not available anymore. So how can I solve this?
After some research, the only approach I've found to solve this, is implementing some validation by overriding dbContext's SaveChanges method. I've made a merge of these two approaches to build mine:
Implementing Missing Features in Entity Framework Core - Part 3
Validation in EF Core
The result is...
ApplicationDbContext.cs
public override int SaveChanges(bool acceptAllChangesOnSuccess)
{
ValidateEntities();
return base.SaveChanges(acceptAllChangesOnSuccess);
}
public override async Task<int> SaveChangesAsync(bool acceptAllChangesOnSuccess, CancellationToken cancellationToken = new CancellationToken())
{
ValidateEntities();
return await base.SaveChangesAsync(acceptAllChangesOnSuccess, cancellationToken);
}
private void ValidateEntities()
{
var serviceProvider = this.GetService<IServiceProvider>();
var items = new Dictionary<object, object>();
var entities = from entry in ChangeTracker.Entries()
where entry.State == EntityState.Added || entry.State == EntityState.Modified
select entry.Entity;
foreach (var entity in entities)
{
var context = new ValidationContext(entity, serviceProvider, items);
var results = new List<ValidationResult>();
if (Validator.TryValidateObject(entity, context, results, true)) continue;
foreach (var result in results)
{
if (result == ValidationResult.Success) continue;
var errorMessage = $"{entity.GetType().Name}: {result.ErrorMessage}";
throw new ValidationException(errorMessage);
}
}
}
Note that it's not necessary to override the other SaveChanges overloads, because they call these two.
The Error tells you that youre writing more characters to a field than it can hold.
This error for example would be thrown when you create a given field as NVARCHAR(4) or CHAR(4) and write 'hello' to it.
So you could simply check the length of the values you read in to find the one which is causing your problem. There is at least on which is too long for a field.

Update object using only DbSet

I'm trying to apply the unit of work pattern as described in this blog, but have bumped into the following problem: If I inject the associated DbSet into the repo only, e.g.
public ArticleRepository(DbSet<Article> articles)
{
this.articles = articles;
}
then how do I update records or set their status to modified?
Before I used
public void Update(Article article)
{
this.context.Entry(article).State = EntityState.Modified;
}
but with the new approach I don't have access to DbContext anymore. Neither DbSet.Add nor DbSet.Attach will work here, so how can I update the object in the context?
System.Data.Entity.Migrations.IDbSetExtensions contains the IDbSet extension AddOrUpdate<TEntity>. This will update the entity.
Some people like the advantage of not knowing whether they are adding a new entity or changing an existing one.
However, if you really want an error if you are updating an item that is not added yet, take a look at the Source Code of IDbSetExtensions.AddOrUpdate
Here you can see that the function first checks if the item exists and depending on the result adds or updates it as follows:
var existing = set.SingleOrDefault
(Expression.Lambda<Func <TEntity, bool>> (matchExpression, new[]
{parameter}));
if (existing != null)
{ // entity exists: update it
foreach (var keyProperty in keyProperties)
{
keyProperty.Single().SetValue
(entity, keyProperty.Single().GetValue (existing, null), null);
}
internalSet.InternalContext.Owner.Entry(existing)
.CurrentValues.SetValues (entity);
}
else
{ // not existing entity: Add it
internalSet.Add(entity);
}
If you don't want the AddOrUpdate, but really only an update, consider Creating your own Extension method for IDbSet. See Extension Methods (C# Programming Guide)

Entity Framework and Entity Tracker Problems

If I run the following code it throws the following error:
An entity object cannot be referenced by multiple instances of IEntityChangeTracker
public void Save(Category category)
{
using(var db = new NorthwindContext())
{
if(category.CategoryID == 0)
{
db.AddToCategorySet(category);
}
else
{
//category.RemoveTracker();
db.Attach(category);
}
db.SaveChanges();
}
}
The reason is of course that the category is sent from interface which we got from GetById method which already attached the EntityChangeTracker to the category object. I also tried to set the entity tracker to null but it did not update the category object.
protected void Btn_Update_Category_Click(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
_categoryRepository = new CategoryRepository();
int categoryId = Int32.Parse(txtCategoryId.Text);
var category = _categoryRepository.GetById(categoryId);
category.CategoryName = txtUpdateCategoryName.Text;
_categoryRepository.Save(category);
}
I'm still learning Entity Framework myself, but maybe I can help a little. When working with the Entity Framework, you need to be aware of how you're handling different contexts. It looks like you're trying to localize your context as much as possible by saying:
public void Save(Category category)
{
using (var db = new NorthwindContext())
{
...
}
}
... within your data access method. Did you do the same thing in your GetById method? If so, did you remember to detach the object you got back so that it could be attached later in a different context?
public Category GetById(int categoryId)
{
using (var db = new NorthwindContext())
{
Category category = (from c in db.Category where Category.ID == categoryId select c).First();
db.Detach(category);
}
}
That way when you call Attach it isn't trying to step on an already-attached context. Does that help?
As you pointed out in your comment, this poses a problem when you're trying to modify an item and then tell your database layer to save it, because once an item is detached from its context, it no longer keeps track of the changes that were made to it. There are a few ways I can think of to get around this problem, none of them perfect.
If your architecture supports it, you could expand the scope of your context enough that your Save method could use the same context that your GetById method uses. This helps to avoid the whole attach/detach problem entirely, but it might push your data layer a little closer to your business logic than you would like.
You can load a new instance of the item out of the new context based on its ID, set all of its properties based on the category that is passed in, and then save it. This costs two database round-trips for what should really only need one, and it isn't very maintainable.
You can dig into the context itself to mark the Category's properties as changed.
For example:
public void Save(Category category)
{
using (var db = new NorthwindContext())
{
db.Attach(category);
var stateEntry = db.ObjectStateManager.GetObjectStateEntry(category);
foreach (var propertyName in stateEntry.CurrentValues.DataRecordInfo.FieldMetadata.Select(fm => fm.FieldType.Name)) {
stateEntry.SetModifiedProperty(propertyName);
}
db.SaveChanges();
}
}
This looks a little uglier, but should be more performant and maintainable overall. Plus, if you want, you could make it generic enough to throw into an extension method somewhere so you don't have to see or repeat the ugly code, but you still get the functionality out of it.