EF LINQ Query - Many to Many - asp.net-mvc-3

I need some help getting some data from an EF 4.1 query.
I have a Products table and a Categories table that have a Many-To-Many relationship on them.
I need to select a product by ID and include in it the categories it is associated with.
I came up with this:
Public Function GetProductByID(ID As Integer) As Core.Entities.Product Implements Core.Interfaces.IProductService.GetProductByID
Dim p = ProductRepository.Query.Single(Function(x) x.ID = ID)
p.Categories = CategoryRepository.Query.Where(Function(x) x.Products.Any(Function(y) y.ID = ID)).ToList
Return p
End Function
I am sure there is a better way!

Why not use Include() provided you have a property Categories on your Product entity? (C# syntax):
var p = ProductRepository.Include(x=> x.Categories)
.Single(x => x.ID == ID);
Also see Loading Related Objects

Related

NotSupportedException for LINQ Queries

I am trying to get a list of a database table called oracleTimeCards whose employee id equals to the employeeID in employees list. Here is what I wrote:
LandornetSQLEntities db = new LandornetSQLEntities();
List<OracleEmployee> employees = db.OracleEmployees.Where(e => e.Office.Contains(officeName) && e.IsActive == true).Distinct().ToList();
var oracleTimeCards = db.OracleTimecards.Where(c => employees.Any(e => c.PersonID == e.PersonID)).ToList();
Anyone has any idea?
I'm going to assume you're using Entity Framework here. You can't embed calls to arbitrary LINQ extension methods inside your predicate, since EF might not know how to translate these to SQL.
Assuming you want to find all the timecards for the employees you found in your first query, you have two options. The simplest is to have a navigation property on your Employee class, named let's say TimeCards, that points to a collection of time card records for the given employee. Here's how that would work:
var oracleTimeCards = employees
.SelectMany(e => e.TimeCards)
.ToList();
If you don't want to do this for whatever reason, you can create an array of employee IDs by evaluating your first query, and use this to filter the second:
var empIDs = employees
.Select(e => e.PersonID)
.ToArray();
var oracleTimeCards = db.OracleTimecards
.Where(tc => empIDs.Contains(tc.PersonID))
.ToList();

Entity Framework 4 - What is the syntax for joining 2 tables then paging them?

I have the following linq-to-entities query with 2 joined tables that I would like to add pagination to:
IQueryable<ProductInventory> data = from inventory in objContext.ProductInventory
join variant in objContext.Variants
on inventory.VariantId equals variant.id
where inventory.ProductId == productId
where inventory.StoreId == storeId
orderby variant.SortOrder
select inventory;
I realize I need to use the .Join() extension method and then call .OrderBy().Skip().Take() to do this, I am just gettting tripped up on the syntax of Join() and can't seem to find any examples (either online or in books).
NOTE: The reason I am joining the tables is to do the sorting. If there is a better way to sort based on a value in a related table than join, please include it in your answer.
2 Possible Solutions
I guess this one is just a matter of readability, but both of these will work and are semantically identical.
1
IQueryable<ProductInventory> data = objContext.ProductInventory
.Where(y => y.ProductId == productId)
.Where(y => y.StoreId == storeId)
.Join(objContext.Variants,
pi => pi.VariantId,
v => v.id,
(pi, v) => new { Inventory = pi, Variant = v })
.OrderBy(y => y.Variant.SortOrder)
.Skip(skip)
.Take(take)
.Select(x => x.Inventory);
2
var query = from inventory in objContext.ProductInventory
where inventory.ProductId == productId
where inventory.StoreId == storeId
join variant in objContext.Variants
on inventory.VariantId equals variant.id
orderby variant.SortOrder
select inventory;
var paged = query.Skip(skip).Take(take);
Kudos to Khumesh and Pravin for helping with this. Thanks to the rest for contributing.
Define the join in your mapping, and then use it. You really don't get anything by using the Join method - instead, use the Include method. It's much nicer.
var data = objContext.ProductInventory.Include("Variant")
.Where(i => i.ProductId == productId && i.StoreId == storeId)
.OrderBy(j => j.Variant.SortOrder)
.Skip(x)
.Take(y);
Add following line to your query
var pagedQuery = data.Skip(PageIndex * PageSize).Take(PageSize);
The data variable is IQueryable, so you can put add skip & take method on it. And if you have relationship between Product & Variant, you donot really require to have join explicitly, you can refer the variant something like this
IQueryable<ProductInventory> data =
from inventory in objContext.ProductInventory
where inventory.ProductId == productId && inventory.StoreId == storeId
orderby inventory.variant.SortOrder
select new()
{
property1 = inventory.Variant.VariantId,
//rest of the properties go here
}
pagedQuery = data.Skip(PageIndex * PageSize).Take(PageSize);
My answer here based on the answer that is marked as true
but here I add a new best practice of the code above
var data= (from c in db.Categorie.AsQueryable().Join(db.CategoryMap,
cat=> cat.CategoryId, catmap => catmap.ChildCategoryId,
cat, catmap) => new { Category = cat, CategoryMap = catmap })
select (c => c.Category)
this is the best practice to use the Linq to entity because when you add AsQueryable() to your code; system will converts a generic System.Collections.Generic.IEnumerable to a generic System.Linq.IQueryable which is better for .Net engine to build this query at run time
thank you Mr. Khumesh Kumawat
You would simply use your Skip(itemsInPage * pageNo).Take(itemsInPage) to do paging.

Subquery nightmares in EF

I'm really, really struggling with what should otherwise be a straightforward query in anything other than LINQ (for example SQL!)
I have two entities:
Product
ProductApprover
The Product entity has a one to many relationship on the ProductApprover entity, e.g:
Product.ProductApprovers gives me all ProductApprover entities relating to the Product.
Getting a Product and associated ProductApprover data is simple enough when querying by my ProductID column on my Product entity as the ProductApprover data associated is bundled into the result automatically, but my problem comes when I want to alter my query by querying data WITHIN my associated ProductApprover entities. I have tried all sorts with use of the 'Where', 'Contains' and 'Any', functions, etc, to perform a subquery, but cannot seem to get the result I want.
The query I want to perform is:
SELECT * FROM Product p
INNER JOIN ProductApprover pa ON p.ProductId = pa.ProductId
WHERE p.ProductId = #id AND pa.Version = #version
Can anybody help me out please? Thank you kindly in advance.
Try this (I guess this is a LINQ interpretation of your SQL query):
int id = 123;
int version = 555;
var results = from p in context.Products
join pa in context.ProductApprovers
on p.ProductId = pa.ProductId
where p.ProductId equals id && pa.Version equals version
select new { Product = p, Approver = pa };
I suspect you want something like this:
var query = from product in db.Products
where product.ProductId == productId
select new {
Product = product,
Approvers = product.Approvers.Where(pa => pa.Version == version)
};
If that doesn't do what you want, could you explain where it falls down?

LINQ queries with many-to-many tables in Entity Data Model

I'm trying to use LINQ to query the following Entity Data Model
based on this db model
I'd like to be able to pull a list of products based on ProductFacets.FacetTypeId.
Normally, I'd use joins and this wouldn't be a problem but I don't quite understand how to query many-to-many tables under the Entity DataModel.
This is an example sql query:
select p.Name, pf.FacetTypeId from Products p
inner join ProductFacets pf on p.ProductId = pf.ProductId
where pf.FacetTypeId in(8, 12)
Presuming EF 4:
var facetIds = new [] { 8, 12 };
var q = from p in Context.Products
where p.FacetTypes.Any(f => facetIds.Contains(f.FacetTypeId))
select p;
In EF (assuming the mapping is done correctly), joins are hardly ever used; navigation properties are used instead.
Your original SQL returns a tuple with repeated Name entries. With LINQ, it's often easier
to "shape" the queries into non-tuple results.
The following should be the same as the SQL, only instead of returning (Name, FacetTypeId) pairs with repeated Names, it will return a type that has a Name and a sequence of FacetTypeIds:
var facetIds = new [] { 8, 12 };
var result = from p in db.Products
select new
{
p.Name,
FacetTypeIds = from pf in p.FacetTypes
where pf.FacetTypeId == 8 || pf.FacetTypeId == 12
select pf.FacetTypeId,
};

How to write linq query based on EF?

Suppose I have three tables:
Person(pid, ...)
PersonAddress(pid, aid,...)
Address(aid, ...)
Then I want to get the person address like sql:
select a.* from address a join PersonAddress pa on a.addressID=pa.addressID
where pa.personID = myPersonID
Use Entity Framework to create Entity model, then want to write a linq equivalent as above sql.
I tried it in following way:
var addresses = this.GetAddress();
var personaddresses = this.GetPersonAddress();
var query = from ad in addresses
from pa in personaddresses
where ((ad.AddressID == pa.AddressID)&&(pa.PersonID==person.personID))
select ad;
but I got error. Or I try to start from:
var result = this.Context.Address;
var result = result.Join .... //how to write linq in this way?
How to write the linq?
This is untested but if you have all of your relationships setup and you create the model (I have used Model as the name for this) from this you should be able to use the following:
var values = this.Model.Address.Select(a => a.PersonAddress.Where(pa => pa.Id == myPersonID));
You almost never use join in LINQ to Entities.
Try:
var q = from p in Context.People
where p.PersonId == personId
from a in p.Addresses // presumes p.Addresses is 1..*
select a;
Assuming you have three entities: Person, PersonAddress and Address, here is a query that should meet your needs (this example assumes an Entity Framework context named context):
var values = context.PersonAddress.Where(pa => pa.Person.PersonId == myPersonId).Select(pa => pa.Address);
However, if the PersonAddress table exists as a pure many-to-many relationship table (i.e. contains only keys), you'd be better off setting up your Entity Framework model in such a way that the intermediate table isn't necessary, which would leave you with the much simpler:
var values = context.Person.Where(p => p.PersonId == myPersonId).Addresses;
Based on the additional feedback
Because you need to include the country table, you should originate your query from the Address table. In that case:
var values = context.Address.Where(a => a.PersonAddress.Where(pa => pa.Product.Id == myProductId).Count() > 0)
To include the Country table in the result:
var values = context.Address.Include("Country").Where(a => a.PersonAddress.Where(pa => pa.Product.Id == myProductId).Count() > 0)

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