How do I loop through a collection of LINQ to Entities collection? - linq

I have the following LINQ to Entities call to fill a collection variable:
var insuredFamily = db.Insureds.Where(x => x.ssn.Split('-')[0] == tmp[MemberId])
.OrderBy(x => x.fk_relation);
How would I go about looping through the items in the collection printing out both the item header and the item value for each row?
I'm new to LINQ to Entities, so all I'm trying to do is loop through a built collection and output the headers and rows to a log file so that I can quickly see what is being returned in the collection without resorting to stepping through each row in the debugger. Is this possible?
If a generic loop is not possible, is it possible to set the data source of a data grid to the collection variable and view the collection in a grid?

For starters, this can't be a LINQ-to_Entities statement. There's no way to translate x.ssn.Split('-')[0] == tmp[MemberId] into SQL. Unless this is EF-Core, that automatically switches to client-side evaluation when the expression contain not-supported part. You're not explicit about that.
Anyway, it's overkill to add logging just to see the content of a collection while debugging. You can use the immediate window in Visual Studio to output data when the code stops at a break point.
To make this really helpful, override the Insured class's ToString method. When I do this with just some Product class ...
public override string ToString()
{
return string.Format("{0}, {1}", this.Name, this.UnitPrice);
}
... and break in the debugger right after a line like ...
var prod = context.Products;
.. then in the immediate window I can type ...
?prod.ToList()
... which gives me:
Count = 6
[0]: {Nike Air, 150.00}
[1]: {Web cam, 23.00}
[2]: {Mouse, 7.00}
[3]: {Cool pack, 4.50}
[4]: {Keyboard, 47.30}
[5]: {Action cam, 73.00}
(and some SQL logging)
Note that this is invasive debugging. By calling ToList, the query is forced to execute. This may change the state in a way that it affects the code's behavior. The same would hold for logging though.

Thank you for all the advice, but it looks like the following two lines of code will do what I need. I just wanted to visualize the results of my LINQ to SQL queries.
var nationalities = db.Nationalities.OrderBy(x => x.pk_Nationality);
dgvResults.DataSource = nationalities;
This code will simply put the collection into the data source of my data grid view allowing me to see all the contents.

Related

update a property value during linq to sql select (involves join)

Ok I have seen many questions that based on their text could be something like this but not quite. Say I have something like this
(from r in reports
join u in SECSqlClient.DataContext.GetTable<UserEntity>()
on r.StateUpdateReportUserID equals u.lngUserID
select r).
If reports have a bunch of say reportDTO class and I want to select from a list of that DTO but at the same time set one property to a property in userEntity how would I do that? Basically I want all other fields on the report maintained but set a user name from the user table. (There is a reason this is not done in one big query that gets a list of reports)
What I am looking for is something like Select r).Something(SOME LAMBDA TO SET ONE FIELD TO userEntity property).
There is a dirty way to do this, which is
var repQuery = from r in reports ... select new { r, u };
var reps = repQuery.Select(x => { x.r.Property1 = x.u.Property1; return x.r; };
However, When it comes to functional programming (which Linq is, arguably) I like to adhere to its principles, one of which to prevent side effects in functions. A side effect is a change in state outside the function body, in this case the property value.
On the other hand, this is a valid requirement, so I would either use the ForEach method after converting the query to list (ToList()). Foreach is expected to incur side effects. Or I would write a clearly named extension method on IEnumerable<T> (e.g. DoForAll) that does the same, but in a deferred way. See Why there is no ForEach extension method on IEnumerable?.

NHibernate IQueryable doesn't seem to delay execution

I'm using NHibernate 3.2 and I have a repository method that looks like:
public IEnumerable<MyModel> GetActiveMyModel()
{
return from m in Session.Query<MyModel>()
where m.Active == true
select m;
}
Which works as expected. However, sometimes when I use this method I want to filter it further:
var models = MyRepository.GetActiveMyModel();
var filtered = from m in models
where m.ID < 100
select new { m.Name };
Which produces the same SQL as the first one and the second filter and select must be done after the fact. I thought the whole point in LINQ is that it formed an expression tree that was unravelled when it's needed and therefore the correct SQL for the job could be created, saving my database requests.
If not, it means all of my repository methods have to return exactly what is needed and I can't make use of LINQ further down the chain without taking a penalty.
Have I got this wrong?
Updated
In response to the comment below: I omitted the line where I iterate over the results, which causes the initial SQL to be run (WHERE Active = 1) and the second filter (ID < 100) is obviously done in .NET.
Also, If I replace the second chunk of code with
var models = MyRepository.GetActiveMyModel();
var filtered = from m in models
where m.Items.Count > 0
select new { m.Name };
It generates the initial SQL to retrieve the active records and then runs a separate SQL statement for each record to find out how many Items it has, rather than writing something like I'd expect:
SELECT Name
FROM MyModel m
WHERE Active = 1
AND (SELECT COUNT(*) FROM Items WHERE MyModelID = m.ID) > 0
You are returning IEnumerable<MyModel> from the method, which will cause in-memory evaluation from that point on, even if the underlying sequence is IQueryable<MyModel>.
If you want to allow code after GetActiveMyModel to add to the SQL query, return IQueryable<MyModel> instead.
You're running IEnumerable's extension method "Where" instead of IQueryable's. It will still evaluate lazily and give the same output, however it evaluates the IQueryable on entry and you're filtering the collection in memory instead of against the database.
When you later add an extra condition on another table (the count), it has to lazily fetch each and every one of the Items collections from the database since it has already evaluated the IQueryable before it knew about the condition.
(Yes, I would also like to be the extensive extension methods on IEnumerable to instead be virtual members, but, alas, they're not)

How can I use set operations to delete objects in an entitycollection that match a collection of view models?

Here is a very basic example of what I want to do. The code I have come up with seems quite verbose... ie looping through the collection, etc.
I am using a Telerik MVC grid that posts back a collection of deleted, inserted and updated ViewModels. The view models are similar but not exactly the same as the entity.
For example... I have:
Order.Lines. Lines is an entity collection (navigation property) containing OrderDetail records. In the update action of my controller using the I have a List names DeletedLines pulled from the POST data. I also have queried the database and have the Order entity including the Lines collection.
Now I basically want to tell it to delete all the OrderDetails in the Lines EntityCollection.
The way I have done it is something like:
foreach (var line in DeletedLines) {
db.DeleteObject(Order.Lines.Where(l => l.Key == line.Key).SingleOrDefault())
}
I was hoping there was a way that I could use .Interset() to get a collection of entities to delete and pass that to DeleteObject.. however, DeleteObject seems to only accept a single entity rather than a collection.
Perhaps the above is good enough.. but it seemed like there should be an easier method.
Thanks,
BOb
Are the items in DeletedLines attached to the context? If so, what about this?
foreach (var line in DeletedLines) db.DeleteObject(line);
Response to comment #1
Ok, I see now. You can make your code a bit shorter, but not much:
foreach (var line in DeletedLines) {
db.DeleteObject(Order.Lines.SingleOrDefault(l => l.Key == line.Key))
}
I'm not sure if DeleteObject will throw an exception when you pass it null. If it does, you may be even better off using Single, as long as you're sure the item is in there:
foreach (var line in DeletedLines) {
db.DeleteObject(Order.Lines.Single(l => l.Key == line.Key))
}
If you don't want to re-query the database and either already have the mapping table PK values (or can include them in the client call), you could use one of Alex James's tips for deleting without first retrieving:
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/alexj/archive/2009/03/27/tip-9-deleting-an-object-without-retrieving-it.aspx

EF4.1 LINQ, selecting all results

I am new to LINQ queries and to EF too, I usually work with MySQL and I can't guess how to write really simples queries.
I'd like to select all results from a table. So, I used like this:
ZXContainer db = new ZXContainer();
ViewBag.ZXproperties = db.ZXproperties.All();
But I see that I have to write something inside All(---).
Could someone guide me in how could I do that? And if someone has any good link for references too, I thank so much.
All() is an boolean evaluation performed on all of the elements in a collection (though immediately returns false when it reaches an element where the evaluation is false), for example, you want to make sure that all of said ZXproperties have a certain field set as true:
bool isTrue = db.ZXproperties.All(z => z.SomeFieldName == true);
Which will either make isTrue true or false. LINQ is typically lazy-loading, so if you're calling db.ZXproperties directly, you have access to all of the objects as is, but it isn't quite what you're looking for. You can either load all of the objects at the variable assignment with an .ToList():
ViewBag.ZXproperties = db.ZXproperties.ToList();
or you can use the below expression:
ViewBag.ZXproperties = from s in db.ZXproperties
select s;
Which is really no different than saying:
ViewBag.ZXproperties = db.ZXproperties;
The advantage of .ToList() is that if you are wanting to do multiple calls on this ViewBag.ZXproperties, it will only require the initial database call when it is assigning the variable. Alternatively, if you do any form of queryable action on the data, such as .Where(), you'll have another query performed, which is less than ideal if you already have the data to work with.
To select everything, just skip the .All(...), as ZXproperties allready is a collection.
ZXContainer db = new ZXContainer();
ViewBag.ZXproperties = db.ZXproperties;
You might want (or sometimes even need) to call .ToList() on this collection before use...
You don't use All. Just type
ViewBag.ZXproperties = db.ZXproperties;
or
ViewBag.ZXproperties = db.ZXproperties.ToList();
The All method is used to determine if all items of collection match some condition.
If you just want all of the items, you can just use it directly:
ViewBag.ZXproperties = db.ZXproperties;
If you want this evaluated immediately, you can convert it to a list:
ViewBag.ZXproperties = db.ZXproperties.ToList();
This will force it to be pulled across the wire immediately.
You can use this:
var result = db.ZXproperties.ToList();
For more information on linq see 101 linq sample.
All is some checking on all items and argument in it, called lambda expression.

ADO.NET Data Services, LINQ

I have C# code to populate a dropdown list in Silverlight which works fine except when there are duplicates. I think because IEnumerable<Insurance.Claims> is a collection, it filters out duplicates. How would I code my LINQ query to accept duplicates?
My Sample Data looks like:
Code => CodeName
FGI Field General Initiative
SRI Static Resource Initiative
JFI Joint Field Initiative - This is "overwritten" in results
JFI Joint Friend Initiative
IEnumerable<Insurance.Claims> results;
// ADO.NET Data Service
var claim = (from c in DataEntities.Claims.Expand("Claimants").Expand("Policies")
where c.Claim_Number == claimNumber
select c);
DataServiceQuery<Insurance.Claims> dataServiceQuery =
claim as DataServiceQuery<Insurance.Claims>;
dataServiceQuery.BeginExecute((asyncResult) =>
{
results = dataServiceQuery.EndExecute(asyncResult);
if (results == null)
{
// Error
}
else
{
// Code to populate Silverlight form
}
});
(Not sure if you're still struggling with this but anyway...)
I'm pretty sure it's not the IEnumerable interface but the actual drop down that is causing this behaviour. The code is being used as the key, and so obviously each time the same code is encountered, the item is being overwritten.
I don't think you can override this unless you change the code, or use another identifier as the key field in the dropdown.
You may want to add a try-catch block around dataServiceQuery.EndExecute(asyncResult) to properly handle errors.

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