How to make IQueryable<out T> work with a reqular IQueryable? - linq

I am using Linq2SQL and working with a legacy system. The system was built in .Net but without a datalayer so I am transcoding it so that it will have one. I have a linq query that looks like this...
var data = from p in db.tblPeoples
orderby p.strLastName,p.strFirstName
select new
{
guidPersonId = p.guidPersonId,
strFirstName = p.strFirstName,
strLastName = p.strLastName,
strRank = p.tblCodesRank.strDescription,
strPhone = p.strPhone,
strEmail = p.strEmail,
strOffice = p.tblOrganization.strAcronym,
RolesList = p.tblRoles
};
and when I check the signature of the var it is an IQueryable and I have no idea what that is. In my datalayer I have this returning as an IQueryable, but when I try to use the datalayer version and then do a .where on the returned dataset to search on it, I get errors that I Cannot convert lambda expresstion to type 'string' because it is not a delegate type.
What should I do about this? I am trying to create code reuse and use my datalayer version that is already written. the data layer version looks like this:
public static IQueryable RetrieveAllPeople()
{
var data = from p in db.tblPeoples
orderby p.strLastName, p.strFirstName
select new
{
guidPersonId = p.guidPersonId,
strFirstName = p.strFirstName,
strLastName = p.strLastName,
strRank = p.tblCodesRank.strDescription,
strPhone = p.strPhone,
strEmail = p.strEmail,
strOffice = p.tblOrganization.strAcronym,
RolesList = p.tblRoles
};
return data;
}

Your return type should be IQueryable<T>, which is not the same as IQueryable.
To do so, you need to create a class to fill in your select instead of using an anonymous one like you do.

Related

ef6 linq method returning $ref for nested entries in query

my linq method system from EF6 is returning $ref when I monitor results in fiddler. If I watch the local window in my webapi everything is populated correctly, but not in the actual results that are returned. It only affects the nested entries. anyone know what I am doing wrong? (I created models from database in EF6)
var student = dbEF.Accounts
.Where(x => x.AccountNumber == acctNum)
.Select(x => new DTOCrmDetails()
{
AccountNumber = x.AccountNumber,
CommissionId = x.CommissionId,
Commission = x.Commission,
ManagerID = x.ManagerID,
ManagerName = x.Manager.ManagerName,
Manager = x.Manager,
Employees = x.Manager.Employees,
WireInstructionsUSD = x.Manager.WireInstructionsUSDs
//Mapping_ManagersExecutingBrokers = x.Manager.Mapping_ManagersExecutingBrokers
}).FirstOrDefault();
return student;
these are my settings.
var json = config.Formatters.JsonFormatter; json.SerializerSettings.PreserveReferencesHandling = Newtonsoft.Json.PreserveReferencesHandling.Objects; config.Formatters.Remove(config.Formatters.XmlFormatter); config.Formatters.JsonFormatter.SerializerSettings.Formatting = Newtonsoft.Json.Formatting.Indented; config.Formatters.JsonFormatter.SerializerSettings.ContractResolver = new CamelCasePropertyNamesContractResolver();
You need to disable your lazy loading in the entity framework dbcontext.
something like this way:
dbEF.Configuration.LazyLoadingEnabled = false;

Linq in C# using IEnumerable

Appearently, I got an error if using the following code. It said:
Cannot implicity converrt type System.Linq.IQueryable<AnonymousType> to System.Collection.Generic.IEnumerable.
Please advise how I can fix this?
public IEnumerable<Session> GetAllListDetailConsumer(string refId)
{
ObjectQuery<Session> sessions = db.Sessions;
ObjectQuery<SessionsList> sessionsLists = db.SessionsList;
var query =
from s in sessions
join sList in sessionsLists on s.ReferralListID equals sList.ReferralListID
where s.ReferralListID == new Guid(refId)
select new SessionConsumerList
{
ReferralListID = s.ReferralListID,
SessionServerId = s.SessionServerID,
ApplicationID = s.ApplicationID,
// ...
ConsumerID = sList.ConsumerID,
ConsumerFirstName = sList.ConsumerFirstName,
ConsumerFamilyName = sList.ConsumerFamilyName,
// ...
};
return query.ToList();
}
You are selecting using select new, which would create an anonymous type, you need to project to class Session in your query like.
select new Session
{
....
But remember if your Session class is a representing a table in your database/data context, then you can't project to that class, instead you may have to create a temporary class and project the selection to that class.
EDIT (Since the question now has been edited)
Now you are selecting new SessionConsumerList and you are returning IEnumerable<Session>, you need to modify method signature to return IEnumerable<SessionConsumerList>
Why not separate the creation of the SessionConsumerList in another method? Makes the code a lot cleaner. Like this:
public static SessionConsumerList CreateSessionConsumerList(
Session s,
SessionsList sList)
{
return new SessionConsumerList
{
ReferralListID = s.ReferralListID,
SessionServerId = s.SessionServerID,
ApplicationID = s.ApplicationID,
// ...
ConsumerID = sList.ConsumerID,
ConsumerFirstName = sList.ConsumerFirstName,
ConsumerFamilyName = sList.ConsumerFamilyName,
// ...
};
}
And then:
var query =
from s in sessions
join sList in sessionsLists on s.ReferralListID equals sList.ReferralListID
where s.ReferralListID == new Guid(refId)
select CreateSessionConsumerList(s, sList);

How to use a string in the linq where clause?

I am trying to send a Linq query as a string to a method to be used in a where clause. Since IEnumerable wouldn't work for this, I have converted my IEnumerable to IQueryable and still it throws error. The following is the code:
public static void FilterData(string Query)
{
if((List<MemberMaintenanceData>)HttpContext.Current.Session["Allmembers"] != null)
{
//Get the IEnumerable object colection from session
var data = (List<MemberMaintenanceData>) HttpContext.Current.Session["Allmembers"];
//Convert it to IQueryable
IQueryable<MemberMaintenanceData> queryData = data.AsQueryable();
//This line doesn't compile!!
queryData = queryData.Where(Query);
HttpContext.Current.Session["Allmembers"] = queryData.AsEnumerable().ToList();
}
}
I intended passing "a => a.AccountId == 1000" as Query
There is a free (and open source) library, provided by Microsoft for parsing strings into Lambda expressions that can then be used in Linq queries. It also contains versions of the standard query operators such as Where() that take a string parameter. You can find it described in Scott Guthries blog post on Dynamic Linq.
For example, you can do queries like this (adapted from a snippet from the Scott guthrie link)
// imagine these have come from a drop down box or some other user input...
string thingToSelectBy = "City";
string citySelectedByUser = "London";
int minNumberOfOrders = 10;
string whereClause = String.Format("{0} = #0 and Orders.Count >= #1", thingToSelectBy);
var query = db.Customers
.Where(whereClause, citySelectedByUser, minNumberOfOrders)
.OrderBy("CompanyName")
.Select("new(CompanyName as Name, Phone");
The Where clause in thisw code snippet shows how you create a where clause using a parameterised string and then dynamically inject values for the parameters at run time, for example, based on user input. This works for parameters of any type.
In your example, the where clause would be
whereClause = "AccountId = 1000";
So in effect you would be doing something like
var newFilteredQueryData = queryData.Where("AccountId = 1000");
That link also contains the location where you can download the source code and a comprehensive document describing the dynamic query API and expression language.
Given a class such as:
public class foo
{
public int AccountID {get;set;}
}
You should be able to do something like this:
Expression<Func<foo, bool>> filter = f => f.AccountID == 1000;
And then pass that as your query. If it is really needed as a string you can do this:
filter.ToString();
//By Using this library
using System.Linq.Dynamic.Core;
InventoryList = Repository.GetAll(); // IQueryable
string filterString = "UnitPrice > 10 And Qty>100 OR Description.Contains("Dairy")";
var filteredGenericList = InventoryList.Where(filterString);

linq: Using methods in select clause

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
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.
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?

How to dynamically add OR operator to WHERE clause in LINQ

I have a variable size array of strings, and I am trying to programatically loop through the array and match all the rows in a table where the column "Tags" contains at least one of the strings in the array. Here is some pseudo code:
IQueryable<Songs> allSongMatches = musicDb.Songs; // all rows in the table
I can easily query this table filtering on a fixed set of strings, like this:
allSongMatches=allSongMatches.Where(SongsVar => SongsVar.Tags.Contains("foo1") || SongsVar.Tags.Contains("foo2") || SongsVar.Tags.Contains("foo3"));
However, this does not work (I get the following error: "A lambda expression with a statement body cannot be converted to an expression tree")
allSongMatches = allSongMatches.Where(SongsVar =>
{
bool retVal = false;
foreach(string str in strArray)
{
retVal = retVal || SongsVar.Tags.Contains(str);
}
return retVal;
});
Can anybody show me the correct strategy to accomplish this? I am still new to the world of LINQ :-)
You can use the PredicateBuilder class:
var searchPredicate = PredicateBuilder.False<Songs>();
foreach(string str in strArray)
{
var closureVariable = str; // See the link below for the reason
searchPredicate =
searchPredicate.Or(SongsVar => SongsVar.Tags.Contains(closureVariable));
}
var allSongMatches = db.Songs.Where(searchPredicate);
LinqToSql strange behaviour
I recently created an extension method for creating string searches that also allows for OR searches. Blogged about here
I also created it as a nuget package that you can install:
http://www.nuget.org/packages/NinjaNye.SearchExtensions/
Once installed you will be able to do the following
var result = db.Songs.Search(s => s.Tags, strArray);
If you want to create your own version to allow the above, you will need to do the following:
public static class QueryableExtensions
{
public static IQueryable<T> Search<T>(this IQueryable<T> source, Expression<Func<T, string>> stringProperty, params string[] searchTerms)
{
if (!searchTerms.Any())
{
return source;
}
Expression orExpression = null;
foreach (var searchTerm in searchTerms)
{
//Create expression to represent x.[property].Contains(searchTerm)
var searchTermExpression = Expression.Constant(searchTerm);
var containsExpression = BuildContainsExpression(stringProperty, searchTermExpression);
orExpression = BuildOrExpression(orExpression, containsExpression);
}
var completeExpression = Expression.Lambda<Func<T, bool>>(orExpression, stringProperty.Parameters);
return source.Where(completeExpression);
}
private static Expression BuildOrExpression(Expression existingExpression, Expression expressionToAdd)
{
if (existingExpression == null)
{
return expressionToAdd;
}
//Build 'OR' expression for each property
return Expression.OrElse(existingExpression, expressionToAdd);
}
}
Alternatively, take a look at the github project for NinjaNye.SearchExtensions as this has other options and has been refactored somewhat to allow other combinations
There is another, somewhat easier method that will accomplish this. ScottGu's blog details a dynamic linq library that I've found very helpful in the past. Essentially, it generates the query from a string you pass in. Here's a sample of the code you'd write:
Dim Northwind As New NorthwindDataContext
Dim query = Northwind.Products _
.Where("CategoryID=2 AND UnitPrice>3") _
.OrderBy("SupplierId")
Gridview1.DataSource = query
Gridview1.DataBind()
More info can be found at scottgu's blog here.
Either build an Expression<T> yourself, or look at a different route.
Assuming possibleTags is a collection of tags, you can make use of a closure and a join to find matches. This should find any songs with at least one tag in possibleTags:
allSongMatches = allSongMatches.Where(s => (select t from s.Tags
join tt from possibleTags
on t == tt
select t).Count() > 0)

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