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Editorial Team
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Asked: 2026-05-26T14:07:06+00:00

I’m trying to architect my MVC web project and I’m running into a bit

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I’m trying to architect my MVC web project and I’m running into a bit of a problem.

I am using EF4.1. I’ve created a DataAccess project with the EDMX file. Then I use the dbContext generator to make my POCO .tt classes.

As it is right now, my Business logic layer can access the POCO classes just fine, but the presentation layer cannot.

I think that I’m supposed to create another level of abstraction and put the dbContext .tt files into their own project so that both the BusinessLogic layer and the Presentation layer can access the POCO classes, but only the BusinessLogic has access to the entity framework. The presentation layer shouldn’t need to know anything about EF.

Something like this…

POCO Classes - DataAccess
    |             |
    |---------Business Logic
    |             |
    |_________Presentation

Am I on the right track here, and if so, do I simply cut/paste the .tt files into the new project or is there a way to force the dbContext add-on to create these in my other project?

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1 Answer

  1. Editorial Team

    Your presentation layer doesn’t have to know anything about the EF. Just reference that project from your presentation layer to access the models.

    However – your presentation layer shouldn’t ideally be using any of those POCO models. They should be using ViewModels. I dont necessarily believe in the DTOs here as DTOs have a specific purpose. Your repository/data access can return models but generally those get returned to a service layer. The service layer then would return your ViewModel representation to your controller.

    This sets you up nicely for dependency injection as well, since into your controller you just inject your service layer. Into your service you can inject then any repositories you need, and so on.

    Ironically I think I may be working on a book for this exact subject shortly : )

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