Specify an SQL username other than dbo in Code First Entity Framework ( C# ASP.NET MVC 3 )

Question

I\'m trying to connect to an SQL Server 2008 database in a shared hosting environment from C# from within an ASP.NET MVC 3 application connecting via EF (code first).

<

Answer 1

I know this question is a bit old, but I came across it in my research and came up with a solution that may benefit others, and have discussed it privately with @ppumkin.

The schema name can be passed as a string to the ToTable() method, so essentially using a member of the containing class instead of a hard-coded value allows you to dynamically specify the schema name upon context creation.

This is a dumbed down version of what I have:

public class FooDbContext : DbContext
{
    public string SchemaName { get; set; }

    static FooDbContext()
    {
        Database.SetInitializer(null);
    }

    public FooDbContext(string schemaName)
        : base("name=connString1")
    {
        this.SchemaName = schemaName;
    }

    protected override void OnModelCreating(DbModelBuilder modelBuilder)
    {
        modelBuilder.Configurations.Add(new City_Map(this.SchemaName));
        modelBuilder.Configurations.Add(new Customer_Map(this.SchemaName));
        modelBuilder.Configurations.Add(new CustomerSecurity_Map(this.SchemaName));
        base.OnModelCreating(modelBuilder);
    }

    public DbSet Customers { get; set; }
    public DbSet Cities { get; set; }

}

And the mapping abstract class:

public abstract class SchemaNameEntityTypeConfiguration : EntityTypeConfiguration where TEntityType : class
{
    public string SchemaName { get; set; }
    public SchemaNameEntityTypeConfiguration(string schemaName)
        : base()
    {
        this.SchemaName = schemaName;
    }

    public new void ToTable(string tableName)
    {
        base.ToTable(tableName, SchemaName);
    }
}

Implementation:

public class City_Map : SchemaNameEntityTypeConfiguration
{
    public City_Map(string schemaName)
        : base(schemaName)
    {
        ToTable("City");
        HasKey(t => t.Code);

        Property(t => t.Code)
            .HasColumnType("integer")
            .HasDatabaseGeneratedOption(DatabaseGeneratedOption.None);

        Property(t => t.CityName)
            .HasColumnName("City")
            .HasMaxLength(50);

        Property(t => t.State)
            .HasMaxLength(2);
    }
}

The key thing to note here is the ToTable() method in SchemaNameEntityConfiguration. It overrides the superclass' method so when the implementations call ToTable(tableName) it supplies the schema name as well.

*Important note: EntityTypeConfiguration.ToTable() is non-virtual, and the abstract SchemaNameEntityTypeConfiguration hides that method with its own and thus won't be called virtually if the _Map object is type as EntityTypeConfiguration.

It was one concern of mine but there's an easy (and only slightly annoying) work around: instead of implementing a base class that supplies it automatically, just ensure in the _Map classes you pass the schemaName to ToTable().

Usage:

using (FooDbContext context = new FooDbContext("theSchemaName"))
{
    foreach (
        var customer in context.Customers
                .Include(c => c.City)
            .Where(c => c.CustomerName.StartsWith("AA"))
            .OrderBy(c => c.CustomerCode)
        )
    {
        Console.WriteLine(string.Format(
            "{0:20}: {1} - {2}, {3}",
            customer.CustomerCode,
            customer.CustomerName,
            customer.City.CityName,
            customer.City.State));
    }
}

Disclaimer: I haven't tested using multiple contexes within the same program. It shouldn't have an issue, but if the DbContext caches the model at a static class level (rather than at the instance-level), it could be a problem. That may be resolved by creating separate subclasses of the context though, each specifying a different schema name.