Question

I’m writing a code generator and am getting stuck on determining the nullable status of a stored procedure result set Column. I can query the DataType just fine but neither the datareader object nor a data table column contain the correct nullable value of my column.

        public List<DataColumn> GetColumnInfoFromStoredProcResult(string schema, string storedProcName)
    {
        //build sql text
        var sb = new StringBuilder();
        sb.Append("SET FMTONLY OFF; SET FMTONLY ON; \n");//this is how EF4.1 did so I copied..not sure why the repeat

        sb.Append(String.Format("exec {0}.{1} ", schema, storedProcName));

        var prms = GetStoredProcedureParameters(schema: schema, sprocName: storedProcName);
        var count = 1;
        foreach (var param in prms)
        {
            sb.Append(String.Format("{0}=null", param.Name));
            if (count < prms.Count)
            {
                sb.Append(", ");
            }
            count++;
        }

        sb.Append("\n SET FMTONLY OFF; SET FMTONLY OFF;");

        var dataTable = new DataTable();
        //var list = new List<DataColumn>();

        using (var sqlConnection = this.SqlConnection)
        {
            using (var sqlAdapter = new SqlDataAdapter(sb.ToString(), sqlConnection))
            {
                if (sqlConnection.State != ConnectionState.Open) sqlConnection.Open();
                sqlAdapter.SelectCommand.ExecuteReader(CommandBehavior.KeyInfo);
                sqlConnection.Close();
                sqlAdapter.Fill(dataTable);
            }

            //using (var sqlCommand = new SqlCommand())
            //{

            //    sqlCommand.CommandText = sb.ToString();
            //    sqlCommand.CommandType = CommandType.Text;
            //    sqlCommand.Connection = sqlConnection;
            //    if (sqlConnection.State != ConnectionState.Open) sqlConnection.Open();

            //    var dr = sqlCommand.ExecuteReader(CommandBehavior.SchemaOnly);
            //    var whateva = dr.GetSchemaTable();

            //    foreach (DataColumn col in whateva.Columns)
            //    {
            //        list.Add(col);
            //    }
            //}
        }

        var list = dataTable.Columns.Cast<DataColumn>().ToList();

        return list;
    }

I’m trying to end up with something similar to the the Entities Framework creation of a complex type from a stored procedure. Can I hijack that functionality?

On this example the Id column.. tblJobId (not my naming convention) would never be null.. But I selected null as ImNull and it has all the same properties so how does EF determine if the corresponding C# data type should be nullable or not?

Has anybody done this..

Ideas are appreciated.

Answer 1

The secret was to use Schema Only and fill a dataset not datatable. Now the AllowDbNull property on the datacolumn properly displays the nullable status of the return value.

This was it…

 public List<DataColumn> GetColumnInfoFromStoredProcResult(string schema, string storedProcName)
    {
        //build sql text
        var sb = new StringBuilder();
        sb.Append("SET FMTONLY OFF; SET FMTONLY ON; \n");//this is how EF4.1 did so I copied..not sure why the repeat

        sb.Append(String.Format("exec {0}.{1} ", schema, storedProcName));

        var prms = GetStoredProcedureParameters(schema: schema, sprocName: storedProcName);
        var count = 1;
        foreach (var param in prms)
        {
            sb.Append(String.Format("{0}=null", param.Name));
            if (count < prms.Count)
            {
                sb.Append(", ");
            }
            count++;
        }

        sb.Append("\n SET FMTONLY OFF; SET FMTONLY OFF;");

        var ds = new DataSet();
        using (var sqlConnection = this.SqlConnection)
        {
            using (var sqlAdapter = new SqlDataAdapter(sb.ToString(), sqlConnection))
            {
                if (sqlConnection.State != ConnectionState.Open) sqlConnection.Open();
                sqlAdapter.SelectCommand.ExecuteReader(CommandBehavior.SchemaOnly);
                sqlConnection.Close();
                sqlAdapter.FillSchema(ds, SchemaType.Source, "MyTable");
            }
        }

        var list = ds.Tables[0].Columns.Cast<DataColumn>().ToList();

        return list;
    }

    public List<SqlParamInfo> GetStoredProcedureParameters(string schema, string sprocName)
    {
        var sqlText = String.Format(
            @"SELECT
                [Name] = N'@RETURN_VALUE',
                [ID] = 0,
                [Direction] = 6,
                [UserType] = NULL,
                [SystemType] = N'int',
                [Size] = 4,
                [Precision] = 10,
                [Scale] = 0
            WHERE
                OBJECTPROPERTY(OBJECT_ID(N'{0}.{1}'), 'IsProcedure') = 1
            UNION
            SELECT
                [Name] = CASE WHEN p.name <> '' THEN p.name ELSE '@RETURN_VALUE' END,
                [ID] = p.parameter_id,
                [Direction] = CASE WHEN p.is_output = 0 THEN 1 WHEN p.parameter_id > 0 AND p.is_output = 1 THEN 3 ELSE 6 END,
                [UserType] = CASE WHEN ut.is_assembly_type = 1 THEN SCHEMA_NAME(ut.schema_id) + '.' + ut.name ELSE NULL END,
                [SystemType] = CASE WHEN ut.is_assembly_type = 0 AND ut.user_type_id = ut.system_type_id THEN ut.name WHEN ut.is_user_defined = 1 OR ut.is_assembly_type = 0 THEN st.name WHEN ut.is_table_type =1 Then 'STRUCTURED' ELSE 'UDT' END,
                [Size] = CONVERT(int, CASE WHEN st.name IN (N'text', N'ntext', N'image') AND p.max_length = 16 THEN -1 WHEN st.name IN (N'nchar', N'nvarchar', N'sysname') AND p.max_length >= 0 THEN p.max_length/2 ELSE p.max_length END),
                [Precision] = p.precision,
                [Scale] = p.scale
            FROM
                sys.all_parameters p
                INNER JOIN sys.types ut ON p.user_type_id = ut.user_type_id
                LEFT OUTER JOIN sys.types st ON ut.system_type_id = st.user_type_id AND ut.system_type_id = st.system_type_id
            WHERE
                object_id = OBJECT_ID(N'{0}.{1}') 
            ORDER BY 2", schema, sprocName);


        using (var sqlConnection = this.SqlConnection)
        {
            using (var sqlCommand = new SqlCommand())
            {
                if (sqlConnection.State != ConnectionState.Open) sqlConnection.Open();

                sqlCommand.Connection = sqlConnection;
                sqlCommand.CommandType = CommandType.Text;
                sqlCommand.CommandText = sqlText;

                var dr = sqlCommand.ExecuteReader();

                var result = new List<SqlParamInfo>();

                while (dr.Read())
                {
                    if (Convert.ToString(dr["Name"]) != "@RETURN_VALUE")
                    {
                        result.Add(new SqlParamInfo(dr));
                    }
                }

                return result;
            }
        }
    }