Question

In the following blog: http://weblogs.asp.net/scottgu/archive/2010/07/16/code-first-development-with-entity-framework-4.aspx

The blog contains the following code sample:

public class Dinner
{
   public int DinnerID { get; set; }
   public string Title { get; set; }
   public DateTime EventDate { get; set; }
   public string Address { get; set; }
   public string HostedBy { get; set; }
   public virtual ICollection<RSVP> RSVPs { get; set; }
}

public class RSVP
{
   public int RsvpID { get; set; }
   public int DinnerID { get; set; }
   public string AttendeeEmail { get; set; }
   public virtual Dinner Dinner { get; set; }
}

What is the purpose of using virtual when defining a property in a class? What effect does it have?

Answer 1

It allows the Entity Framework to create a proxy around the virtual property so that the property can support lazy loading and more efficient change tracking. See What effect(s) can the virtual keyword have in Entity Framework 4.1 POCO Code First? for a more thorough discussion.

Edit to clarify "create a proxy around":
By "create a proxy around", I’m referring specifically to what the Entity Framework does. The Entity Framework requires your navigation properties to be marked as virtual so that lazy loading and efficient change tracking are supported. See Requirements for Creating POCO Proxies.
The Entity Framework uses inheritance to support this functionality, which is why it requires certain properties to be marked virtual in your base class POCOs. It literally creates new types that derive from your POCO types. So your POCO is acting as a base type for the Entity Framework’s dynamically created subclasses. That’s what I meant by "create a proxy around".

The dynamically created subclasses that the Entity Framework creates become apparent when using the Entity Framework at runtime, not at static compilation time. And only if you enable the Entity Framework’s lazy loading or change tracking features. If you opt to never use the lazy loading or change tracking features of the Entity Framework (which is not the default), then you needn’t declare any of your navigation properties as virtual. You are then responsible for loading those navigation properties yourself, either using what the Entity Framework refers to as "eager loading", or manually retrieving related types across multiple database queries. You can and should use lazy loading and change tracking features for your navigation properties in many scenarios though.

If you were to create a standalone class and mark properties as virtual, and simply construct and use instances of those classes in your own application, completely outside of the scope of the Entity Framework, then your virtual properties wouldn’t gain you anything on their own.

Edit to describe why properties would be marked as virtual

Properties such as:

 public ICollection<RSVP> RSVPs { get; set; }

Are not fields and should not be thought of as such. These are called getters and setters, and at compilation time, they are converted into methods.

//Internally the code looks more like this:
public ICollection<RSVP> get_RSVPs()
{
    return _RSVPs;
}

public void set_RSVPs(RSVP value)
{
    _RSVPs = value;
}

private RSVP _RSVPs;

That’s why they’re marked as virtual for use in the Entity Framework; it allows the dynamically created classes to override the internally generated get and set functions. If your navigation property getter/setters are working for you in your Entity Framework usage, try revising them to just properties, recompile, and see if the Entity Framework is able to still function properly:

 public virtual ICollection<RSVP> RSVPs;