linq: Using methods in select clause - linq

Question

I'm breaking my head with this and decided to share my problem with you
I want to create an anonymous select from several tables, some of them may contain more than one result. i want to concatenate these results into one string
i did something like this:
var resultTable = from item in dc.table
select new
{
id= item.id,
name= CreateString((from name in item.Ref_Items_Names
select name.Name).ToList()),
};
and the CreateString() is:
private string CreateString(List<string> list)
{
StringBuilder stringedData = new StringBuilder();
for (int i = 0; i < list.Count; i++)
{
stringedData.Append(list[i] + ", ");
}
return stringedData.ToString();
}
my intentions were to convert the "name" query to list and then sent it to CreateString() to convert it to one long concatenated string.
I tried using .Aggregate((current,next) => current + "," + next);
but when i try to convert my query to DataTable like below:
public DataTable ToDataTable(Object query)
{
DataTable dt = new DataTable();
IDbCommand cmd = dc.GetCommand(query as IQueryable);
SqlDataAdapter adapter = new SqlDataAdapter();
adapter.SelectCommand = (SqlCommand)cmd;
cmd.Connection.Open();
adapter.Fill(dt);
cmd.Connection.Close();
return dt;
}
I'm getting exception that "dc.GetCommand()" can't understand query with Aggregate method
later I tried to even use this simple query:
var resultTable = from itemin dc.table
select new
{
name = CreateString()
};
When CreateString() returns "success", nothing was inserted to "name"
why there is no way of using methods in select clause?
Thank you
Yotam

Answer 1

There is difference between LINQ to objects and LINQ to some-db-provider. Generally speaking, when using IQueryable, you can't use any methods, except the ones your provider understands.
What you can do is to retrieve the data from the database and then do the formatting using LINQ to objects:
var data = from item in dc.table
where /* some condition */
select item;
var result = from item in data.AsEnumerable()
select new
{
name = SomeFunction(item)
}
The AsEnumerable() extension method forces processing using LINQ to objects.

Answer 2

Forgive me if I've miss interpreted your question. It seems that what you are trying to do is abstract your select method for reuse. If this is the case, you may consider projection using a lambda expression. For example:
internal static class MyProjectors
{
internal static Expression<Func<Object1, ReturnObject>> StringDataProjector
{
get
{
return d => new Object1()
{
//assignment here
}
}
}
}
Now you can select your datasets as such:
dc.Table.Select(MyProjectors.StringDataProjector)
As for the concatenation logic, what about selecting to some base class with an IEnumerable<string> property and a read-only property to handle the concatenation of the string?