I’m trying to create a project from scratch. I’ll be using asp .net mvc4 (with asp net web api), and entity framework 5 for data access (all the latest technologies)
Since it’s a fresh start, I was thinking on centering my design on my model rather than creating the database first and then creating the EF model, so I though I’d go with a code first approach.
The problem with code first (as far as I see) is that you lose all the scaffolding that EF does for you on a model first scenario (design support, easily generating and maintaining entity relationships 1-1, 1-*, –, etc)
The question is : What tools or templates or snippets or whatever can I use to make my life easier when designing my model?. I want this process to be as painless as possible, since it involves a lot of repetition (FK relationships, for example, are the same always)
Should I use DbContext or something else? Is there some kind of way to start code first but at the same time maintain an edmx model, or those are mutually exclusive?
thanks!
The great thing about EF Code First is that you don’t need any scaffolding. You don’t need an EDMX model, you don’t even need to specify the exact nature of relationships, it’s all based on conventions. For example your classes must have a property called Id, which will be taken to be the Primary Key of the table. All string based fields are generated as
nvarchar(MAX). Of course some conventions might not be what you want and Code First supports this through pluggable conventions (you can remove most conventions and create your own)You should do some of the basic tutorials to get an idea of how the Code First flow works as it’s an entirely different proposition to the Db First approach.