ADO.NET Mapping From SQLDataReader to Domain Object? - ado.net

I have a very simple mapping function called "BuildEntity" that does the usual boring "left/right" coding required to dump my reader data into my domain object. (shown below) My question is this - If I don't bring back every column in this mapping as is, I get the "System.IndexOutOfRangeException" exception and wanted to know if ado.net had anything to correct this so I don't need to bring back every column with each call into SQL ...
What I'm really looking for is something like "IsValidColumn" so I can keep this 1 mapping function throughout my DataAccess class with all the left/right mappings defined - and have it work even when a sproc doesn't return every column listed ...
Using reader As SqlDataReader = cmd.ExecuteReader()
Dim product As Product
While reader.Read()
product = New Product()
product.ID = Convert.ToInt32(reader("ProductID"))
product.SupplierID = Convert.ToInt32(reader("SupplierID"))
product.CategoryID = Convert.ToInt32(reader("CategoryID"))
product.ProductName = Convert.ToString(reader("ProductName"))
product.QuantityPerUnit = Convert.ToString(reader("QuantityPerUnit"))
product.UnitPrice = Convert.ToDouble(reader("UnitPrice"))
product.UnitsInStock = Convert.ToInt32(reader("UnitsInStock"))
product.UnitsOnOrder = Convert.ToInt32(reader("UnitsOnOrder"))
product.ReorderLevel = Convert.ToInt32(reader("ReorderLevel"))
productList.Add(product)
End While

Also check out this extension method I wrote for use on data commands:
public static void Fill<T>(this IDbCommand cmd,
IList<T> list, Func<IDataReader, T> rowConverter)
{
using (var rdr = cmd.ExecuteReader())
{
while (rdr.Read())
{
list.Add(rowConverter(rdr));
}
}
}
You can use it like this:
cmd.Fill(products, r => r.GetProduct());
Where "products" is the IList<Product> you want to populate, and "GetProduct" contains the logic to create a Product instance from a data reader. It won't help with this specific problem of not having all the fields present, but if you're doing a lot of old-fashioned ADO.NET like this it can be quite handy.

Although connection.GetSchema("Tables") does return meta data about the tables in your database, it won't return everything in your sproc if you define any custom columns.
For example, if you throw in some random ad-hoc column like *SELECT ProductName,'Testing' As ProductTestName FROM dbo.Products" you won't see 'ProductTestName' as a column because it's not in the Schema of the Products table. To solve this, and ask for every column available in the returned data, leverage a method on the SqlDataReader object "GetSchemaTable()"
If I add this to the existing code sample you listed in your original question, you will notice just after the reader is declared I add a data table to capture the meta data from the reader itself. Next I loop through this meta data and add each column to another table that I use in the left-right code to check if each column exists.
Updated Source Code
Using reader As SqlDataReader = cmd.ExecuteReader()
Dim table As DataTable = reader.GetSchemaTable()
Dim colNames As New DataTable()
For Each row As DataRow In table.Rows
colNames.Columns.Add(row.ItemArray(0))
Next
Dim product As Product While reader.Read()
product = New Product()
If Not colNames.Columns("ProductID") Is Nothing Then
product.ID = Convert.ToInt32(reader("ProductID"))
End If
product.SupplierID = Convert.ToInt32(reader("SupplierID"))
product.CategoryID = Convert.ToInt32(reader("CategoryID"))
product.ProductName = Convert.ToString(reader("ProductName"))
product.QuantityPerUnit = Convert.ToString(reader("QuantityPerUnit"))
product.UnitPrice = Convert.ToDouble(reader("UnitPrice"))
product.UnitsInStock = Convert.ToInt32(reader("UnitsInStock"))
product.UnitsOnOrder = Convert.ToInt32(reader("UnitsOnOrder"))
product.ReorderLevel = Convert.ToInt32(reader("ReorderLevel"))
productList.Add(product)
End While
This is a hack to be honest, as you should return every column to hydrate your object correctly. But I thought to include this reader method as it would actually grab all the columns, even if they are not defined in your table schema.
This approach to mapping your relational data into your domain model might cause some issues when you get into a lazy loading scenario.

Why not just have each sproc return complete column set, using null, -1, or acceptable values where you don't have the data. Avoids having to catch IndexOutOfRangeException or re-writing everything in LinqToSql.

Use the GetSchemaTable() method to retrieve the metadata of the DataReader. The DataTable that is returned can be used to check if a specific column is present or not.

Why don't you use LinqToSql - everything you need is done automatically. For the sake of being general you can use any other ORM tool for .NET

If you don't want to use an ORM you can also use reflection for things like this (though in this case because ProductID is not named the same on both sides, you couldn't do it in the simplistic fashion demonstrated here):
List Provider in C#

I would call reader.GetOrdinal for each field name before starting the while loop. Unfortunately GetOrdinal throws an IndexOutOfRangeException if the field doesn't exist, so it won't be very performant.
You could probably store the results in a Dictionary<string, int> and use its ContainsKey method to determine if the field was supplied.

I ended up writing my own, but this mapper is pretty good (and simple): https://code.google.com/p/dapper-dot-net/

Related

Dapper QueryMultiple Stored Procedures w/o mapping to Objects

With dapper, I can do batch execute for Stored Procedures, something similar to:
connection.Execute(#"
exec sp1 #i = #one, #y = #two
exec sp2 #i = #three",
new { one = 1, two = 2, three = 3 });
However, the only means of retrieving data that I have seen till now is by using
results.Read<Type>()
What if the results don't map to an object? For instance, I am writing "generic" code to execute any SP with variable in/out parameters & result sets.
Thanks
What API do you want? If you can process the grids separately: do that:
using(var multi = connection.QueryMultiple(...))
{
while(!multi.IsConsumed) {
// ...
}
}
where ... has access to:
Read() for dynamic rows - noting that each row also implements IDictionary<string,object>
Read<T>() for typed rows via generics
Read(Type) for typed rows without generics
Read<DapperRow>() (actually, this is just the T that Read<T>() uses to implement Read(), but perhaps more convenient), which provides slightly more access to metadata
If you want to drop to a raw IDataReader, do that:
using(var reader = connection.ExecuteReader(...)) {
// whatever you want
}
With regards to parameters: the DynamicParameters class provides much richer access to parameter control, including parameter-direction etc.

MongoDB C# - update using custom strongly-typed objects not allowed?

I am trying to perform an update using strongly-typed objects. For example,
public void setAppointmentPrefs(string UserName, IEnumerable<AppointmentInfo> info)
{
var query = new QueryDocument {{ "ProviderId", UserName}};
var update = Update.Set("Prefs",prefs); // prefs.toList() gives same error
// providerprefs initialized in constructor
providerprefs.Update(query, update);
}
I receive a compiler error saying:Error 14 The best overloaded method match for 'MongoDB.Driver.Builders.Update.Set(string, MongoDB.Bson.BsonValue)' has some invalid arguments
Obviously the Mongo driver will not let me update based on my own object (whether as IEnumerable or prefs.toList()), which seems a contrast from the way it permits me to insert or query with custom objects. Surely I am missing something obvious that would permit me to avoid deserializing, weakly typing then creating a generic BsonDocument!! TIA.
You can do an Update based on your own types! Have you tried using the typed Query and Update builders?
Try something like this:
var query = Query<AppointmentInfo>.EQ(i => i.ProviderId, userName);
var update = Update<AppointmentInfo>.Set(i => i.Prefs, info.Prefs);
Not sure I got the types and everything write from your partial code, but that should give you the general idea.
Let me know if you have any further questions.
I know this has been answered but I for one don't fully understand Roberts answer.
All I did is call the "ToBsonDocument()" method for it to except the object as a parameter
So:
customObject.ToBsonDocument()
If you have an array of objects inside a document:
var query = Query.EQ("_id", ObjectId.Parse(id.ToString()));
var update = Update.Push("ArrayOfObjects", customObject.ToBsonDocument());
collection.Update(query, update);

How do we convert a column from table to an arraylist using ormlite?

I'm trying to convert an entire column values into a arrayList using ormlite on android, is this possible, with direct api?
Using raw results i get close, but not quite:
GenericRawResults<String[]> rawResults =
getHelper().getMyProcessDao().queryRaw(
queryBuild.selectColumns("nid").prepareStatementString());
List<String[]> result = rawResults.getResults();
Hrm. I'm not sure this is what you want. However, one way to accomplish what you ask for specifically is through by using the RawRowMapper which can be passed to ORMLite's DAO method: dao.queryRaw(String, Rowmapper, String...).
Something like the following should work:
RawRowMapper<Integer> mapper = new RawRowMapper<Integer>() {
public Integer mapRow(String[] columnNames, String[] resultColumns) {
// maybe you should verify that there _is_ only 1 column here
// maybe you should handle the possibility of a bad number and throw
return Integer.parseInt(resultColumns[0]);
}
};
GenericRawResults<Integer> rawResults =
getHelper().getMyProcessDao().queryRaw(
queryBuild.selectColumns("nid").prepareStatementString(), mapper);
List<Integer> list = rawResults.getResults();

NullReferenceException while trying to including a one-to-many relationship item after saving parent

Framework: I'm using using MVC 3 + EntityFramework 4.1 Code-First.
Concept: One Legislation entity has many Provision entities. The idea is that the user enters a Legislation entity, that gets saved then the function that saves it passes it along to another function to see whether that Legislation has a ShortTitle. If it does, then it formats it into a properly worded string and includes it as the Legislation's first Provision, then saves the changes to db.
Issue: The problem is, I've tried coding it in different ways, I keep getting a NullReferenceException, telling me to create a new object instance with the "new" keyword, and points me to the savedLegislation.Provisions.Add(provision); line in my second function.
Here are the two functions at issue, this first one saves the Legislation proper:
public Legislation Save(NewLegislationView legislation)
{
Legislation newLegislation = new Legislation();
// Simple transfers
newLegislation.ShortTile = legislation.ShortTile;
newLegislation.LongTitle = legislation.LongTitle;
newLegislation.BillType = legislation.BillType;
newLegislation.OriginatingChamber = legislation.OriginatingChamber;
newLegislation.Preamble = legislation.Preamble;
// More complicated properties
newLegislation.Stage = 1;
this.NumberBill(newLegislation); // Provides bill number
newLegislation.Parliament = db.LegislativeSessions.First(p => p.Ending >= DateTime.Today);
newLegislation.Sponsor = db.Members.Single(m => m.Username == HttpContext.Current.User.Identity.Name);
// And save
db.Legislations.Add(newLegislation);
db.SaveChanges();
// Check for Short titles
this.IncludeShortTitle(newLegislation);
// return the saved legislation
return newLegislation;
}
And the second function which is invoked by the first one deals with checking whether ShortTitle is not empty and create a Provision that is related to that Legislation, then save changes.
public void IncludeShortTitle(Legislation legislation)
{
var savedLegislation = db.Legislations.Find(legislation.LegislationID);
if (savedLegislation.ShortTile.Any() && savedLegislation.ShortTile.ToString().Length >= 5)
{
string shortTitle = "This Act may be cited as the <i>" + savedLegislation.ShortTile.ToString() + "</i>.";
var provision = new Provision()
{
Article = Numbers.CountOrNull(savedLegislation.Provisions) + 1,
Proponent = savedLegislation.Sponsor,
Text = shortTitle
};
savedLegislation.Provisions.Add(provision);
db.SaveChanges();
}
}
I've been researching how SaveChanges() works and whether it is properly returning the updated entity, it does (since I get no issue looking it up in the second function). If it works properly, and the legislation is found and the provision is newly created in the second function, I don't see what is the "null" reference it keeps spitting out.
The null reference in this case would be savedLegislation.Provisions. The Provisions collection won't be initialized to a new List<Provision> when EF returns your Legislation instance from the db.Legislations.Find(...) method.
The first thing I'd try is something like this:
var savedLegislation = db.Legislations
.Include("Provisions")
.First(l => l.LegislationID == legislation.LegislationID);
... but I'd also consider just using the legislation instance that was passed into the method rather than fetching it from the database again.

Linq to Entities and Xml Fields

I have this scenario:
A SQL Server table myTable with field1, xmlField (nvarchar(50) and xml sql server data type)
Linq to entities
Now I'd like to get a query like this:
SELECT Field1, XmlField
FROM MyTable
WHERE CAST(XmlField AS nvarchar(4000)) = '<myXml />'
Obviously this is a correct query in SQL Server but I can't find a solution to write this in L2E.
Please notify that this code doesn't work:
var query = from row in context.MyTables
where (string)row.XmlField == "<myXml />"
select row
and other cast methods too.
This just because in L2E the "ToString" does't work correctly.
Now my idea is this one: an extension method:
var query = from row in context.MyTables
select row
query = query.CompareXml("XmlField", "<myXml />")
and this is the extended method:
public static IQueryable<TSource> CompareXml<TSource>(this IQueryable<TSource> source, string xmlFieldName, string xmlToCompare)
{
ConstantExpression xmlValue = Expression.Constant(xmlToCompare);
ParameterExpression parameter = Expression.Parameter(typeof(TSource), source.ElementType.Name);
PropertyInfo propertyInfo = typeof(TSource).GetProperty(xmlFieldName);
MemberExpression memberAccess = Expression.MakeMemberAccess(parameter, propertyInfo);
var stringMember = Expression.Convert(memberAccess, typeof(string));
BinaryExpression clauseExpression = Expression.Equal(xmlValue, stringMember);
return source.Where(Expression.Lambda<Func<TSource, bool>>(clauseExpression, parameter));
}
and again this doesn't work too.
Now I'd like to understand how I can force a "Convert" using Cast so I can compare Xml and nvarchar.
Thanks in advance
Massimiliano
Unfortunately EF still doesn't properly support XML columns. I'm afraid pretty much the only choice I know of is to create a view that does the cast and map that to a different entity. This will probably make the code awkward but also offers additional possible scenarios; for example, with a lot of SQL code, you could map elements in the XML columns to actual columns in the view, allowing you to make queries on specific parts of the XML.
On the bright side, at least inserting values in an XML column works pretty much as expected.