How to create a view using EF code-first POCO

Chuck Norris picture Chuck Norris · Nov 27, 2012 · Viewed 58.7k times · Source

That simple. I need to create a View using Code First. I found nothing about this on google nor SO. Is there a way to accomplish this?

I need that view to be created and queried using linq, so it's not a solution to create it using an script on Database creation, for example:

var results = from c in db.Customer
join v in db.MyView on c.Id equals v.Id
select c;

A work around is also acceptable. I need a way to query entities against non-constant/ non-entities values.

Answer

Fred picture Fred · Sep 9, 2013

you must manually create the view, just like AnatoliiG stated. (Adding index to a table).

You add the name of the view as an attribute to your class

[Table("UserDTO")]
    public class UserDTO
{
    /* Class code here */
}

You can create an empty migration by specifying the -IgnoreChanges attribute at the end

Add-Migration MigrationName -IgnoreChanges

This gives you an empty migration script that you can manually modify.

You can use your db context to execute your code in your migration script

public partial class editUserDTO : DbMigration
{
    public override void Up()
    {
        string script =
        @"
        CREATE VIEW dbo.UserDTO
        AS SELECT p.PersonId AS UserId, p.FirstName, p.LastName, u.UserName
        FROM dbo.Users u
        INNER JOIN dbo.People p ON u.PersonId = p.PersonId";
        BloggingContext ctx = new BloggingContext();
        ctx.Database.ExecuteSqlCommand(script);
    }

    public override void Down()
    {
        BloggingContext ctx = new BloggingContext();
        ctx.Database.ExecuteSqlCommand("DROP VIEW dbo.UserDTO");
    }
}