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c#asp.netentity-frameworkazuregenerics
Jay
Jay

Reputation: 687

Generic Repository with different databases, entity types and dbcontext

I have implemented a simple generic repository for my asp.net web api project following this easy to follow guide :

http://www.dataworks.ie/blog/entity_framework_5_with_automapper_and_repository_pattern

That works fine.

However my solution in development has two simple databases with the same schema - a SQL Server CE for test/dev and when running local (and offline) and a SQL Azure when online. Both have EF layers created in separate assemblies. I switch the DbContext via the web.config connection string in the constructor of the context class. The problem is with my controller code.

For e.g. if using Azure I would have

public ActionResult Index()
{
    IGenericRepository<MyProj.Data.SqlAzure.User> userRepo = new GenericRepository<MyProj.Data.SqlAzure.User>();

if I'm using SQL Server CE, I would have

public ActionResult Index()
{
    IGenericRepository<MyProj.Data.SqlCe.User> userRepo = new GenericRepository<MyProj.Data.SqlCe.User>();

So I have to manually change to the correct assembly namespace to reference my entities when I switch databases.

Sorry if this has been done to death as haven't done one of these in awhile but what is the best/elegant solution for this scenario? The above one is very dirty looking. Also all my generic repository code is currently in a model folder in same namespace as the web app.

Upvotes: 1

Views: 1446

Answers (2)

Paul Houlston
Paul Houlston

Reputation: 256

The only solution that springs to mind is to have a factory class to create the instances with a switch defined in the config file, e.g.

public DbRepositoryFactory
{    
    public IGenericRepository<User> GetUserRepository()
    {
        return ConfigurationManager.AppSettings["DbSwitch"].Equals("Azure")
            ? new GenericRepository<MyProj.Data.SqlAzure.User>()
            : new GenericRepository<MyProj.Data.SqlCe.User>()
    }
}

Either that or to use reflection.

Upvotes: 1

Thiago Custodio
Thiago Custodio

Reputation: 18387

Since you're using generic repository, it won't know how to determine which user entity you want unless you tell it.

What you can do, create a factory that solves it for you. GenericRepositorySqlAzure and GenericRepositorySqlCe

Upvotes: 1

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