Copy Metadata from Entities to ViewModels in Automapper 5 - model-view-controller

In my MVC application I use Autofac IoC container together with Automapper. It gives me an opportunity to implement custom ViewModels.
The main question: How can I copy Metadata from Entities to ViewModels using Automapper 5.1.1?
I tried to implement Bettys solution, but I can't correctly register new providers using this approach.
Code is also presented below:
ModelMetadataProviders.Current = new MetadataProvider(
AutoMapper.Mapper.Engine.ConfigurationProvider);
ModelValidatorProviders.Providers.Add(new ValidatorProvider(
AutoMapper.Mapper.Engine.ConfigurationProvider);
or
ModelMetadataProviders.Current = new MetadataProvider(
(AutoMapper.IConfigurationProvider)AutoMapper.Mapper.Configuration);
ModelValidatorProviders.Providers.Add(new ValidatorProvider(
(AutoMapper.IConfigurationProvider)AutoMapper.Mapper.Configuration));
There is no property like Mapper.Engine.
When I implement a second approach, I got invalid operation exception:
Additional information: Mapper not initialized. Call Initialize with
appropriate configuration. If you are trying to use mapper instances
through a container or otherwise, make sure you do not have any calls
to the static Mapper.Map methods, and if you're using ProjectTo or
UseAsDataSource extension methods, make sure you pass in the
appropriate IConfigurationProvider instance.
So, how should I initialize AutoMapper.Mapper.Configuration?
Thank you in advance for your time and help.
Or maybe there is another, better way to map metadata with viewmodels?

Related

Data conversion pattern with Business Object, DTO and Entity/Domain Object

In my Spring boot project I use hibernate and basically we have three kinds of objects
DTO object which is used in the controller layer.
Business Object - business object is what we use throughout our application.
Entity/Domain Object - which is used in JPA layer.
When we are ready to save the data we turn the Business Object to Domain/Entity Obj
And when we are ready to send it to the client/controller we can convert the entity object to Business Obj and this Business object in turn to DTO Obj.
Ideally I was told that the conversion logic of changing BOs to -> (DTOs and entities) and vice versa reside in the BOs itself?
How do we achieve this in an efficient way? Can anyone help with any examples?
I love to use Mapstruct in all the projects that I am participate in
There are several things that I adore most about it:
Obviously, you spend less time on coding the conversions (have a look at 'MapStruct in 2 Minutes' on the main page)
If you the property names in your class that you want to transform to and from are the same then you write even less of code.
It integrates well with spring, so you don`t need to declare any beans or something, just specify that it is "spring" component model.
You have variety of ways how to map entities - create new, update existing with values from DTO(for example).
Children objects are easily mapped as well. It has internal mechanism that tries to pick up the right mapper method in other mappers. Or you can specify its name yourself arbitrary.
Though you can also have a look at ModelMapper as well. Pretty similar library, but less used by myself. So cannot make any particular advice.
There is no silver bullet for this task, but you can consider using model mapper for that; that's the simple example https://www.baeldung.com/entity-to-and-from-dto-for-a-java-spring-application

Spring state machine builder using StateTransition object

I couldn't find any reference with this functionality. Shall I just implement a helper method in the builder to read fields in StateTransition object and populate the chain configureTransition() call by myself??
Just to confirm not to reinvent the wheels.
UPDATE:
I'm trying to use StateMachineBuilder to configure with some pre-defined states and transitions in a properties file. In Builder, they use this chained call to generate configuration:
builder.configureTransitions().withExternal().source(s1)....
What I have in mind is, everything read from the file is stored in an object, the spring sm library has this StateTransition object. But as far as I know from the API, there is no way to use it directly to configure a state machine. Instead, I can read individual fields in the object and use the chained call above.
Thanks!
If you want to do it like that, what you mentioned is pretty much only option. Hopefully we get a real support for external state machine definition, i.e. tracked in https://github.com/spring-projects/spring-statemachine/issues/78.

Properly Refactoring to avoid a Circular Dependency

I am having a problem with a circular dependency. Similar question have been asked and I have read a lot of answers. Most deal with a work-around but I would like to refactor so what I have it correct and I would like some input on where I have gone wrong. I can change what I am doing but not the entire project architecture.
I am using VB.Net in Visual Studio 2012.
I have two class libraries:
DataLayer for accessing the database.
DataObject which contains classes that represents my business objects.
My Presentation Layer calls methods in the DataLayer which returns objects from the DataObject class library.
(I have simplified somewhat – I actually have a controller layer but it needs references to the two class libraries above. This is an existing architecture that is from before my time.)
In the DataObject class library I have an abstract class that represents a file. It has properties such as filename, userID, etc. It also has a method, GetFile(), that I code in the derived classes because there are different ways of getting the file. A DataLayer method returns a collection of these file objects, but I don't want to get the actual file until it's needed.
So far, I have a derived class that calls a webService (using properties from the baseClass) and a derived class that accesses the fileSystem. Both return a byte array representing the file. The calling class does not need to know how the file is retrieved.
Now I have a new requirement to build the file on the fly using data from the database. I can get all the data I need using the properties in the base class.
My issue is that my GetFile() method will need to access my DataLayer class library to pull data from the database which causes a circular dependency. The DataLayer class library has a reference to DataObject since that is what it returns. But now I need to call the DataLayer from a class in DataObjects.
I could call the DataLayer from presentation and pass the result to
my DataObject’s GetFile() method, but then my presentation layer
needs to do something special for this derived class. My goal is
that the derived class handles GetFile without presentation knowing
about the implementation.
I could create a new class library for this DataLayer code but I
don't like a special case.
I could access the DB directly in the DataObject class but that
circumvents the layered architecture.
I can’t change our architecture, but I can change my approach.
Any opinions?
I think I have the answer.
In my concrete class, when I am loading the data initially (in the DataLayer), I will get all the data I need to create the file. I'll store it in a new property in my concrete class which my GetFile() method will use to build the file.
This has a little more overhead - I make DB calls and put all this data in memory when it may not be needed. I'll give it a try and see how performance is.
Any critiques of this approach?

Registering all types in Assembly for Unity

I'm working on a large Asp.Net MVC3 application (>50 views) and we are currently planning on using Unity for our dependency injection framework. For ease of maintenance, I would like to be able to query the assembly to find all of the base types, then register them with Unity.
Based on sample code from the Unity MVC3 Project for registering all controllers, I tried the following code -
var orchestratorTypes = (from t in Assembly.GetCallingAssembly().GetTypes()
where typeof(IOrchesratorBase).IsAssignableFrom(t) &&
!t.IsAbstract
select t).ToList();
orchestratorTypes.ForEach(t => container.RegisterType(t);
When I run the application I get the following error message
The current type, WwpMvcHelpers.BaseClasses.IOrchesratorBase, is an interface and cannot be constructed. Are you missing a type mapping?
If I register the class using individually, as below -
container.RegisterType<IOrchesratorBase, HomeOrchestrator>();
Everything works correctly. Is there a way to do this so that I don't have to register each type individually?
EDIT
Per request, my inheritance hierarchy is
HomeOrcestrator <- IOrchesratorBaseList<LocalModel>
<- OrchesratorBase<LocalModel> <- IOrchesratorBase
The usage in the controller is
public class HomeController : ControllerListBase <HomeOrchestrator, LocalModel>
{
public HomeController() {}
public HomeController(IOrchesratorBase homeOrchestrator) {
this.Orchestrator = (HomeOrchestrator) homeOrchestrator;
}
The LINQ to get the types appears to work. I don't think that's your problem.
You'll get a similar error if you just write
container.RegisterType(typeof(HomeOrchestrator));
and call container.Resolve<IOrchesratorBase>().
In other words, RegisterType(t) is not the same as RegisterType<I, T>().
The real question is, what are you resolving and how do you want it resolved? Your query is finding implementors of IOrchesratorBase. Are your injection constructor parameters of that type? If so, what's Unity supposed to do when 20 types implement that interface?
Can you provide more information on your class/interface hierarchy, constructor parameters, and what you expect/want to happen?
(I'd refactor to change IOrchesratorBase to IOrchestratorBase, BTW.) :)
Edit
Based on the edited question, the problem is that, in order to resolve a HomeController, Unity is looking for a type registration for IOrchesratorBase. It determines the interface type by the parameter types of the constructor with the most parameters.
If you write container.RegisterType<IOrchesratorBase, HomeOrchestrator>() the answer is obvious - Unity will construct an instance of HomeOrchestrator and inject it.
Now, is there more than one type that implements IOrchesratorBase? If so, and you register both of them (explicitly), Unity will use whichever one you register last. That may not be what you want.
If you have multiple controllers, each taking a different interface type in their constructors (with only one implementation per interface), you'll need to figure out what each interface type is and re-run your LINQ registration for each one. That could be done via reflection - find the orchestrators or the controllers.
If you have multiple controllers, each taking the same interface type in their constructors and you want different implementations for each, you've got a problem. You'd have to register named types and determine the names somehow, or something similar.
Unity isn't magic. It can't figure out your intentions.
Addendum
Unity can operate in a convention-over-configuration mode; see Using Unity With Minimal Configuration.

Common LINQ method using EF

So this is probably a stupid question, but I am still not exactly sure how the entity frameworks objects work. I am using EF4 in an MVC3 app, and have two controllers that need to use the same LINQ query against it. Is it best to use a static method that takes the db entity by ref, or should the method use a "using" block for its own entity (as seen in this question)?
I would think the using block would add additional overhead, but I didn't find any examples of the other method. Is there a proper way to make "library" methods for EF access?
In an MVC application the ObjectContext should be scoped to the request. Most DI containers can do this automatically. So you would prefer not using a using block within a method. Instead inject the context via the constructor or pass it as a method argument.

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