Question

I have a view in my database that produces ordered results, but when I run a Linq query over that view, the results are no longer ordered (at least, according to the foreach I use to iterate over the results, and according to the debugger). Is this a known difficulty with Linq, or am I missing something?

Update: my view, from SQL Server 2008 (from design view):

SELECT     TOP (100) PERCENT UrlId, Title, Description, Url, Parent, ResourceKey, Published, dbo.udf_SiteMap_GetRoles(UrlId) AS Roles
FROM         dbo.SiteMap
ORDER BY DisplayOrder

The Linq query that builds the SiteMap:

SqlConnection connection = new SqlConnection(_connect);
DataContext dc = new DataContext(connection);
Table<NodeRoleEntity> siteMapTable = dc.GetTable<NodeRoleEntity>();

var rootQuery = from ne in siteMapTable
                where ne.ParentID == null
                select ne;
foreach (NodeRoleEntity rootNode in rootQuery)
{
   SiteMapNode root = rootNode.AsSiteMapNode(this);
   base.AddNode(root, _root);
   AddChildNodes(root, siteMapTable);
}  

This query uses the SiteMap built above to render menus in my ASP.NET application:

StaticSiteMapProvider _provider = SiteMap.Providers["MySiteMap"] as StaticSiteMapProvider;
string cultureToken = _GetCulture().ToLower();
SiteMapNode cultureRoot = 
    (from SiteMapNode cr in _provider.RootNode.ChildNodes
     where cr.Description == cultureToken
     select cr).First();

int menuCount = 0;            
foreach (SiteMapNode node in cultureRoot.ChildNodes)
{
   _RenderMenu(node, menuCount.ToString(), writer);
   menuCount++;
}  

It is the nodes in cultureRoot.ChildNodes that are ordered improperly (but the rows from which those nodes are derived are ordered).

Answer 1

When you select from a view it doesn’t keep it’s order. You have to put in in the LINQ:

SiteMapNode cultureRoot = (
   from SiteMapNode cr in _provider.RootNode.ChildNodes
   where cr.Description == cultureToken
   orderby cr.DisplayOrder
   select cr
).First();