Support EntityFrameworkCore Many-to-Many Relations

[ab-tools]

Hello Michael,

just wanted to give the EntityFrameworkCore another try on the weekend as in 5.0.0-rc.1 there are now obviously - finally - many-to-many relations available in EntityFrameworkCore as well:
dotnet/efcore#19003

After updating the project to .NET 5.0.0-rc.1 and downloading the very latest version of EFDesigner, when I try to switch an entity model from "EF6" to "EFCore" in the designer I still get the message that many-to-many relations would not be supported in EntityFrameworkCore.

Is that something you plan to support anytime soon?
It's so cool that finally EntityFrameworkCore supports obviously many-to-many relations as well - which was the only thing preventing me to switch over from EF6 so far. Therefore, it's really a pity that EFDesigner seems to block this transition now.

Just let me know in case you would have a pre-release version or so to try with support for that!

Thanks a lot
Andreas

[ab-tools]

... just noticed that you have a nice "EFCore5.x" branch already, @michael-sawczyn! :-)

Tried to compile that myself for a try, but had a hard time to generate the VSIX file:
If you could therefore create a pre-release (or just add the VSIX file to this branch in the "dist" folder) that would be great - then I could give it a try already. Thanks!

[msawczyn]

Hi Andreas,

It's not quite ready for pre-release, but creating a file in dist when checking in isn't a bad idea. Now, if I can just remember to do that, since it only does that when I compile the Release version :-)

[ab-tools]

Thanks for the quick reply as always, @michael-sawczyn! :-)

If it "generally works" already would be cool if you could push a VSIX file to that branch as I really would like to give EF Core a try, but at the moment I simply can't generate my model files without your great product. ;-)

[msawczyn]

That branch now has a nightly build in the dist directory. Note, though, that it's far from done or well tested yet.

[ab-tools]

Thanks, @michael-sawczyn, just did a quick try and this is working pretty nice already actually!

I've only found two issues so far and could resolve the first one myself:

1. Compiling transformation: 'Multiplicity' is an ambiguous reference between 'Sawczyn.EFDesigner.EFModel.Multiplicity' and 'Microsoft.VisualStudio.Modeling.Multiplicity' Miscellaneous Files c:\program files (x86)\microsoft visual studio\2019\preview\common7\ide\extensions\iaom5frb.po2\TextTemplates\EFCoreDesigner.ttinclude 475: I simply added Sawczyn.EFDesigner.EFModel. on all occurrences in that file which fixed the problem.

2. Many-to-many relations are working great now, with the exception that it does not yet like a many-to-many relation to itself yet like this:
   
   This generates in code something like

     modelBuilder.Entity<global::Data.Item>()
                 .HasMany(x => x.Linked)
                 .WithMany();
   

which is invalid (as no argument to WithMany() is provided). But I guess you are aware of this already.

In case you would like me to test something, just let me know - really looking forward to get this fully working with EFCore many-to-many relations! :-)

Thanks
Andreas

[ab-tools]

Hello Michael,

just wanted to carefully ask if you made some progress with the EF Core 5.0 support already? :-)

As I understand Microsoft plans to push .NET 5.0 including EF Core 5.0 out officially this month and looks like there won't be any major changes to it anymore till then. Really looking forward to use the EF Designer also with EF Core 5.0 (especially in regards to the many-to-many support)! ;-)

Thanks as always for your great work
Andreas

[msawczyn]

Trying to get it done. In the final debugging stages now (hopefully final 😉) and, with luck, will have a release candidate within a few days.

…

On Sun, Nov 1, 2020 at 12:14 PM ab-tools ***@***.***> wrote: Hello Michael, just wanted to carefully ask if you made some progress with the EF Core 5.0 support already? :-) As I understand Microsoft plans to push .NET 5.0 including EF Core 5.0 out officially this month and looks like there won't be any major changes to it anymore till then. Really looking forward to use the EF Designer also with EF Core 5.0 (especially in regards to the many-to-many support)! ;-) Thanks as always for your great work Andreas — You are receiving this because you commented. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#217 (comment)>, or unsubscribe <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/AANSGCRAIZHN4X5452K6D4TSNWJNRANCNFSM4RUMBKNA> .

[ab-tools]

That's great to hear, Michael, looking forward to it! :-)

[ab-tools]

After I noticed that you have added a new nightly build yesterday I needed to give it a try, of course!

Not fully working for me yet (also after removing the displaced this.), but I guess it's still to early to provide feedback:
Just let me know when you want to hear about initial test results. 😉

[msawczyn]

v3.0 released today.