Using Model First, what is the best way to approach preservation of existing database data when the model changes and the database has to be regenerated?
The Database Power Pack extension no longer works (I've been trying to contact the author). I can't find anything that provides similar functionality.
R.
If database power pack doesn't work there is no other automatic way. Manual way requires running created SQL script on another database and using Visual Studio Database tools to create difference script between the current and the newly created database.
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I am working with sql server and entity framework in a web ASP.Net C# Project. I am working with "Database first" concept. This mean i draw my database structure from sql server management studio on my local development computer. I add fields, rename fields, add table, change type, etc in the life of my project.
What i want to do is to see what to do when i want to apply database structure changes on my production(s) server(s). Is there a way for entity framework to "detect" changes with a concept of migration versioning like in symphony doctrine ? I actually patch by hand by applying sql scripts on my production server.
Thanks
In all cases you need to do some development tasks
Depends on the entity framework model you are using,
Code first approach : then you can use the reverse engineering, you can find this extension online, you can use the Tools > Extensions and Updates to find it , or you can update your classes manually.
Model first approach: then right click inside the edmx and Update Model from database
I use Model-first with EF, and I want to have an automated gap DDL script when I change my model. With "Entity Framework Database Generation Power Pack" We had it in past, but I read that was not supported in VS2012.
Any changes about that?
For Who dont't understand this need, I would like to remmember that in production enviroments, development team dosen't have access to DB. We must create and send to production Support team, DDL deployment scripts that preserve data and all DB without any recreation.
You should have a look at Database.SetInitializer, which mainly determines what happens if there is no database present when the application is started for the first time, and migrations which can be used to update the datebase when a new application version (which requires an updated database) has been deployed. If the built-in support for migrations data aren't enough, you also have the ability to add raw SQL data to handle migrating to a new version.
I am struggling with entity framework's migration quite a bit. Below is how I plan on using migrations, but I find no information on how to accomplish this:
My users are creating databases (Sql Compact Server) on their premises with different versions of my software. Each version introduces a slightly changed EF model. As soon as a user updates to a newer version of the software and opens a database with a previous version of the model, I would like to have some sort of "auto migration" bring the given database up-to-date to the current model.
Is there any way to do this?
Use the MigrateDatabaseToLatestVersion database initializer. See this link for more info.
I have been working on a side project for the last few weeks, and built the system with EntityFramework Code first. This was very handy during development, as any changes i needed to make to the code were reflected in the DB nice and easily. But now that i want to launch the site, but continue development, i dont want to have to drop and recreate the DB every time i make a tweak to a model...
Is there a way to get EF to generate change scripts for the model change so i can deploy them myself to the production server? And how do i use the database somewhere else (Windows Service in the background of the site) without having to drop and recreate the table, and use the same model as I have already? Kind of like a "Code first, but now i have a production DB, dont break it..."
Personally i use the builtin data tools in VS2010 to do a database schema synchronization for updating production.
Another cheaper tool if you dont have VS Premium is SQLDelta which ive used in the past and is really good.
Both tools connect to the two database versions and allow you to synchronise the table schemas first. Both also have an export to SQL script functionality.
Comming up for EF is Migrations which allows you to solve just this problem within your solution however its still in beta. Migrations lets you describe upgrade and downgrade events for your database in code.
No RTM version of EF has this feature. Once you go to production you must handle it yourselves. The common way is to turn off database initializer in production and use some tool like VS Premium or RedGate Database compare to compare your production and dev database and create change SQL script.
You can also try to use EF Migrations which is exactly the tool you are asking for. The problem is it is still beta (but it should be part of EF 4.3 once completed) so it doesn't have to work in all cases and functionality / API can change in RTM.
My small team used asp.mvc 2.0/entity framework 4.0(model first approach)/Windows Server 2008r2/Sql Server 2008 r2 stack in out web site project. We've already complete developing process, and come to the web deployment stage. In this stage we are faced with the problem - ok we'll use vs2010 features for initial server/db deploy, but what we'll do in the future? Obviously some of our models can be modified after publishing in order to satisfy new conditions, and of course our server db will contains users data sets, articles etc. Is there any approach to update servers db with new db modification, without dropping db, and converting data from old instance to the new one?
Now we have found only DAC/DACPAC approach to update server db, but we don't know how to bind auto EF model generation with DAC.
May be there is exists another solution? Is there any standard way to resolve this kind of situation? Any advice?
Thanks
I'd be interested to know if you have found a solution to this yet?
Have you tried simply generating a database based on your EF model, and using a schema comparison tool such as SQL Compare to deploy changes from the EF-generated database and your target production server?