Class and Interface hierarchies in Entity Framework?

Question

I have two related classes which share a common interface and are both stored in the same underlying database table. However, the Entity Framework generates one common class, wh

Answer 1

Is this data discriminated? i.e. does AccountType define which type it is? If so:

• EF should create the Account entity from the storage
• you then create 2 subclasses (UserAccount and GroupAccount)
• in the mapping for Account, specify a predicate "add a condition"
  • have it map to UserAccount where the AccountType (storage) field is 1 (or whatever)
  • have it map to GroupAccount where the AccountType (storage) field is 2 (or whatever)

The account type then should completely disappear from the Account object (unmap it if not). To get just the UserAccount records, you use

 .Accounts.OfType<UserAccount>()...

The Account class should probably be abstract in this model. The interface stuff can be added via a partial class - i.e. in a separate file, define:

partial class Account : IAccount {
   // extra code here
}

etc

A reasonable walkthrough is here.