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Entity Framework - Duplicate Existing Classes, Code First?

I'm trying to think of a way to store actual templates of ticket items in my Entity Framework MVC project. The thing is, I've already done a Code First migration process in the past. What I need to do is create logic in my code to allow someone to save time creating a ticket by using pre-loaded data from a template. My current inheritance model uses an abstract class (MasterTicket) which is used as the parent since to me there can be multiple categories (a Google Calendar based task, "Appointment Task" and a purely internal task, "General Task"). Here's my parent abstract class:
[Table("Ticket")]
[ModelBinder(typeof(MasterTicketBinder))]
public abstract class MasterTicket
{
[Key]
public Guid id{ get; set; }
[DatabaseGenerated(DatabaseGeneratedOption.Identity)]
public int ART { get; set; }
public DateTime openTime{ get; set; }
public DateTime? closeTime { get; set; }
private bool active = true;
public bool Active{ get => active; set => active = value; }
public string summary{ get; set; }
public string description{ get; set; }
public DateTime updateTime{ get; set; }
//TODO: Create foreign key relationship to user model
public Guid userUpdateId{ get; set; }
//TODO: Create foreign key relationship for tickets from other systems
public Guid externalAppId{ get; set; }
//TODO: Create foreign key relationship to user model
public Guid userOpenId{ get; set; }
public Guid? userCloseId { get; set; }
public Guid userOwnerId{ get; set; }
private int timesUpdated = 0;
public int TimesUpdated { get => timesUpdated; set => timesUpdated = value; }
public DateTime expectedCompletionTime{ get; set; }
public DateTime actualCompletionTime{ get; set; }
public List<MasterTicketItem> masterTicketItems{ get; set; }
public MasterTicket()
{
}
}
An here's an example of the concrete Google Calendar-based "Appointment Task" child:
[Table("AppointmentTickets")]
public class ApptTaskTicket : MasterTicket
{
public DateTime currentApptTime { get; set; }
public DateTime? endApptTime { get; set; }
public bool allDay { get; set; }
public string customerName { get; set; }
//TODO: Create foreign relationship
public Guid subjectPrsnlId { get; set; }
public string gCalEventId { get; set; }
public string customerPhone { get; set; }
public string customerEmail { get; set; }
public string preferredContactMethod { get; set; }
public List<ApptConfirmItem> apptConfirmItems { get; set; }
}
I know I can easily create a column for the MasterTicket class to indicate that it's a template, but to me I feel it's cleaner to have a separate "Template Table" if you will that will store pre-existing values that can be filled in with a form. In this case, I think I would WANT to create a duplicate class that would store said templates so that there are only several rows. What would be the best way to do this with Code First? Does someone feel I should take a different approach? Maybe DB First is a better way to go?
In case it matters, here's my DBContext for the Tickets:
// Code-Based Configuration and Dependency resolution
[DbConfigurationType(typeof(MySqlEFConfiguration))]
public class TicketDB : DbContext
{
public TicketDB(): base("AffirmativeServiceSystem.Properties.Settings.AffirmTaskManager")
{
}
public DbSet<MasterTicket> tickets { get; set; }
public DbSet<MasterTicketItem> ticketItems { get; set; }
}

Automapper, Entity Framework Core and multiple nested collections

My database has two tables - RuleGroups and Rules. My Entity Framework classes are the following:
public class RuleGroup
{
[Key]
public Guid Id { get; set; }
public string Name { get; set; }
public ICollection<Rule> Rules { get; set; }
}
public class Rule
{
[Key]
public Guid Id { get; set; }
public Guid RuleGroupId { get; set; }
public string Name { get; set; }
public ICollection<Condition> Conditions { get; set; }
[ForeignKey("RuleGroupId")]
public virtual RuleGroup RuleGroup { get; set; }
}
[NotMapped]
public class Condition
{
public Guid Id { get; set; }
public string Name { get; set; }
}
Class Condition is not mapped because it is being serialized and stored as JSON in Rule Table (using this example)
My DTOS are the following:
public class UpdateRuleGroupDto
{
public string Name { get; set; }
public ICollection<UpdateRuleDto> Rules { get; set; }
}
public class UpdateRuleDto
{
public string Name { get; set; }
public ICollection<UpdateConditionDto> Conditions { get; set; }
}
public class UpdateConditionDto
{
public string Name { get; set; }
}
In my Startup.cs I initialize Automapper :
AutoMapper.Mapper.Initialize(cfg =>
{
cfg.CreateMap<UpdateRuleGroupDto, RuleGroup>();
cfg.CreateMap<UpdateRuleDto, Rule>();
cfg.CreateMap<UpdateConditionDto, Condition>();
}
I have an API controller endpoint that accepts JSON PATCH document to make changes to data stored in database.
public IActionResult Patch(Guid ruleGroupId, [FromBody]JsonPatchDocument<UpdateRuleGroupDto> body)
{
RuleGroup ruleGroupFromRepo = _deviceRules.GetRuleGroup(ruleGroupId);
UpdateRuleGroupDto ruleGroupToPatch = Mapper.Map<UpdateRuleGroupDto>(ruleGroupFromRepo);
// Patching logic here
Mapper.Map(ruleGroupToPatch, ruleGroupFromRepo);
context.SaveChanges();
return NoContent();
}
The problem:
When changes are made/saved, Rules in Rule table change their/get new GUID.
Example, say we have this data in 2 Tables.
RuleGroup Table
[Id][Name]
[ddad5cac-e5a1-4db7-8167-66a6de3b8a0c][Test]
Rule Table
[Id][RuleGroupId][Name][Condition]
[17c38ee8-4158-4ecc-b893-97786fa76e13][ddad5cac-e5a1-4db7-8167-66a6de3b8a0c][Test][[{"Name":"Test"}]]
If I change field [Name] to a new value, Rules Table will look like this.
Rule Table
[Id][RuleGroupId][Name][Condition]
[ba106de8-bcbc-4170-ba56-80fe619cd757][ddad5cac-e5a1-4db7-8167-66a6de3b8a0c][Test2][[{"Name":"Test"}]]
Note that [Id] field has now a new GUID.
EDIT
#Gert Arnold made me realize that I'm not attaching entities.
I ran the following code:
foreach (var item in ruleGroupFromRepo.rules)
{
var x = _context.Entry(item).State;
}
and all the states were Added and not modified. Now I just have to figure out how to do it properly.

How to map recipes with ingredients using AutoMapper

I have following RecipeModel, IngredientModel and RecipePartModel classes which represent the DTO classes for the frontend user:
public class RecipeModel
{
public Guid Id { get; set; }
public string Name { get; set; }
public string ImageUrl { get; set; }
public string Description { get; set; }
public IEnumerable<RecipePartModel> RecipeParts { get; set; }
}
public class IngredientModel
{
public Guid Id { get; set; }
public string Name { get; set; }
}
public class RecipePartModel
{
public Guid Id { get; set; }
public IngredientModel Ingredient { get; set; }
public string Unit { get; set; }
public decimal Quantity { get; set; }
}
Here are my entity classes:
public class Recipe : BaseEntity
{
[DatabaseGenerated(DatabaseGeneratedOption.Identity)]
[Key]
public Guid Id { get; set; }
public string Name { get; set; }
public string ImageUrl { get; set; }
public string Description { get; set; }
public virtual IEnumerable<RecipePart> RecipeParts { get; set; }
}
public class Ingredient : BaseEntity
{
[DatabaseGenerated(DatabaseGeneratedOption.Identity)]
[Key]
public Guid Id { get; set; }
public string Name { get; set; }
public int Amount { get; set; }
public virtual IEnumerable<RecipePart> RecipeParts { get; set; }
}
public class RecipePart : BaseEntity
{
[DatabaseGenerated(DatabaseGeneratedOption.Identity)]
[Key]
public Guid Id { get; set; }
public Ingredient Ingredient { get; set; }
public Recipe Recipe { get; set; }
public string Unit { get; set; }
public decimal Quantity { get; set; }
}
My question is - how can I map the Recipe to RecipeModel using AutoMapper? I tried something like this but I assume it is bad, because it just join all the RecipeParts for the whole database, am I correct?
public class DomainProfile : Profile
{
public DomainProfile()
{
CreateMap<Ingredient, IngredientModel>().ReverseMap();
CreateMap<Recipe, RecipeModel>()
.ForMember(x => x.RecipeParts, opt => opt.MapFrom(src => src.RecipeParts));
}
}

To answer your question about how to use AutoMapper to map a type to another type, there are many ways of doing this. Documentation is here: http://docs.automapper.org/en/stable/Getting-started.html.
I wrote a console app and got it working in the quickest way I know possible using your code. When I debug this, and check inside recipeModel, it references a list of RecipePartModels with a single RecipePartModel. Inside that RecipePartModel, it references an IngredientModel.
static void Main(string[] args)
{
var profile = new DomainProfile();
Mapper.Initialize(cfg => cfg.AddProfile(profile));
var recipe = new Recipe
{
RecipeParts = new List<RecipePart>
{
new RecipePart()
{
Ingredient = new Ingredient()
}
}
};
var recipeModel = Mapper.Map<Recipe, RecipeModel>(recipe);
Console.ReadKey();
}
To answer your concern about getting all recipes from the database, if you're using Entity Framework, it depends on if you have lazy loading turned on. Lazy loading ensures that, when you get a recipe from the database, the recipe parts will not be loaded. They will only be loaded when you access the recipe part directly later on in the program flow. Lazy loading is turned on by default so this is the default behaviour. If you turn it off, you've enabled eager loading which loads all recipe parts and in turn their ingredient.
This might help: http://www.entityframeworktutorial.net/lazyloading-in-entity-framework.aspx.

There is nothing bad about this mapping. In fact you don't even need the ForMember call as this is the default convention. The mapping will simply convert each element in the entity child collection to a corresponding model object.
Of course, whether you load your entities in an efficient manner is another matter. If you load a large amount of Recipe entities, and lazy load the RecipeParts collections for each, you will have a major "SELECT N+1" problem. But this is not the fault of AutoMapper.

Creating ORM-independent POCO classes

My goal is to create the poco classes without knowing which ORM is going to be used.
Now observe the following code...
public class NeuralModel
{
public NeuralModel()
{
Configurations = new HashSet<NeuralModelConfiguration>();
}
public int Id { get; set; }
public string Name { get; set; }
public DateTime? LastTrained { get; set; }
//Navigation properties
public ICollection<NeuralModelConfiguration> Configurations { get; set; }
//NotMapped properties
[NotMapped]
public NeuralModelConfiguration DefaultConfiguration { get { return Configurations.SingleOrDefault(config => config.IsDefault); } }
[NotMapped]
public bool IsTrained { get { return LastTrained.HasValue; } }
}
public class NeuralModelConfiguration
{
public NeuralModelConfiguration()
{
KeyValues = new HashSet<KeyValuePair<string, string>>();
}
public int Id { get; set; }
public string Name { get; set; }
public string Description { get; set; }
public bool IsDefault { get; set; }
public ICollection<KeyValuePair<string, string>> KeyValues
public int ModelId { get; set; }
//Navigation properties
public NeuralModel Model { get; set; }
}
Now suppose if I were to use Entity Framework Core, I get into the issue of mapping complex types (in my example it would be ICollection<KeyValuePair<string, string>>).
According to my research I came across two possible solutions:
Serialization
Another Entity
Now my question is that is there a third solution that do not require me to change my poco classes but rather do some sort of hidden processing at the dbcontext level?
Should there not be a third solution then out of the 2 available solutions which one would be considered better in terms of performance?

How to model with EntityFramework extensible fields for the entities

I have the following requirement, on my app the Entities will come with some fields, however the user needs to be able to add additional fields to the entity and then values for those fields.
I was thinking something like this but I am not sure if it would be a good approach or not.
The base class is an entity (Not sure which fields I need to add here)
public class Entidad
{
}
Then the Company Class will inherit from Entity
public class Empresa : Entidad
{
[Key]
public int Id { get; set; }
public string Nombre { get; set; }
public string NIT { get; set; }
public string NombreRepresentanteLegal { get; set; }
public string TelefonoRepresentanteLegal { get; set; }
public string NombreContacto { get; set; }
public string TelefonoContacto { get; set; }
public ICollection<CampoAdicional> CamposAdicionales { get; set; }
}
As you can see there is an ICollection of additional fields. that class would have the fieldname, type and id
public class CampoAdicional
{
[Key]
public int Id { get; set; }
public string NombreCampo { get; set; }
public Tiposcampo TipoCampo { get; set; }
}
and then the field value would be something like this:
public class ValorCampo
{
public Entidad Entidad { get; set; }
public CampoAdicional Campo { get; set; }
public string ValorTexto { get;set ; }
public int ValorNumerico { get; set; }
}
However I am not sure if this is the correct model classes for my scenario and whether it would create the tables correctly.

EF works with lazy load so at least there are several "virtual" missings.
In all properties that does not use primitive types and in collections.
Can you extend more than one entity with additional fields? If so you need that ValorCampo contains the entity (Entidad) but the entity should have the Id so you need to move the Id from Empresa to Entidad. Otherwise you need ValorCampo should refer to Empresa not to Entidad