Question

Given the following POCO classes:

public class Certification {
    public int Id { get; set; }
    public virtual ICollection<Employee> CertifiedEmployees { get; set; }
}

public class Employee {
    public int Id { get; set; }
    public virtual ICollection<Certification> Certifications { get; set; }
}

Creating the database model using the EF4 CTP4 code first approach does create the desired junction table:

CREATE TABLE [dbo].[Certifications_CertifiedEmployees](
[Certifications_Id] [int] NOT NULL,
[CertifiedEmployees_Id] [int] NOT NULL,
    ...

However, the table name and the column names are not ideal because they are generated from the associated class property names. I would rather have:

CREATE TABLE [dbo].[Employees_Certifications](
[Employee_Id] [int] NOT NULL,
[Certification_Id] [int] NOT NULL,
    ...

Does anyone know if it is possible to change the generated column names in this scenario, and optionally to also change the table name so that Employees is before Certifications?

Thanks,
Gary

Answer 1

I used the fluent API to modify the generated junction table:

modelBuilder.Entity<Employee>()
    .HasMany(e => e.Certifications)
    .WithMany(c => c.Employees)
    .Map("Employees_Certifications", (e, c) => new { 
        Employee_Id = e.Id, 
        Certification_Id = c.Id });