I have multiple SQL server tables that are the same, but differ in content. In writing a code first EF6 program I am trying to reuse the same db context for each and pass in the table name to the context constructor.
However, while the constructor is being called every time, the OnModelCreating method is only being called once despite the db context being created from new every time. How do I reset this?
I have tried using AsNoTracking and I read along the lines of disabling ModelCaching but couldn't find out how to do this or whether this was the best approach. MSDN even says 'this caching can be disabled by setting the ModelCaching property on the given ModelBuidler[sic],' but it's not there.
This is my DB Context:
public partial class MissingContext : DbContext
{
private string tableName = "";
public MissingContext(string tableName) : base("name=MissingContext")
{
this.tableName = tableName;
}
public virtual DbSet<MissingData> MissingDataSet { get; set; }
protected override void OnModelCreating(DbModelBuilder modelBuilder)
{
modelBuilder.Entity<MissingData>()
.ToTable(this.tableName);
}
}
This is my code to use it:
List<MissingData> missingData=null;
string[] inputTables="TABLEA;TABLEB;TABLEC".Split(';');
foreach (string table in inputTables)
{
logger.Info($"Processing {table}");
missingData = null;
MissingContext db = new MissingContext(table);
var query = from d in db.MissingDataSet.AsNoTracking()
select d;
missingData = query.ToList();
}
In running, table always has the correct TABLEA, TABLEB, TABLEC and it is passed in to the db context constructor, however the OnModelCreating is only called once for the very first loop item so the SQL generated by the query object always selects from TABLEA:
SELECT
[Extent1].[id] AS [id],
[Extent1].[OrganisationName] AS [OrganisationName]
FROM [dbo].[**TABLEA**] AS [Extent1]
*apologies if any code looks wrong, I rename some variables as they are business sensitive.
OnModelCreating
will be called only once that's default behaviour.According to OnModelCreating documentation.
I think the issue here is that per-table is not how contexts are designed to be created.
The design of Entity Framework is that (in the most general case), each table will have one class expressing any row in that table. For a different table, it is expected that another class will be defined. Then, you have your derived
DbContext
.One
DbContext
may service arbitrarily many tables, by creating the appropriateDbSet
for each of your table classes. If you desire them to work in different contexts for some reason, the design of EF would expect a different class derived fromDbContext
with it's ownDbSet
s.A caveat: If you're connecting to merely different databases with the same tables, meaning the columns exactly correspond etc., you can use the same
DbContext
, supplying the constructor with differing connection strings as appropriate.