Asp.Net Identity - IdentityDbContext causin

Question

IdentityDbContext causing problems for properties/fields added to AspNetRoles

I believe the problem is here with IdentityDbContext taking an IdentityUser type:

public class MyIdentityDb : IdentityDbContext<ApplicationUser>
{
    public IdentityDb()
        : base("IdentityDb")
    {
    }
}

But let me explain…

It is wonderful that we can add fields to the AspNetUsers table by adding properties to our ApplicationUser class that inherits from IdentityUser. Example:

public class ApplicationUser : IdentityUser
    {
        [Required]
        [StringLength(50)]
        public string FirstName { get; set; }

        [Required]
        [StringLength(50)]
        public string LastName { get; set; }
    }

So natural we can add fields to the AspNetRoles table by adding properties to an ApplicationRole class that inherits from IdentityRole. Example:

public class ApplicationRole : IdentityRole
{
    [Required]
    [StringLength(50)]
    public string ProperName { get; set; }
}

Works perfect. We can see the field in the database. We can add data to it. Example:

RoleManager<ApplicationRole> roleManager = new RoleManager<ApplicationRole>(new RoleStore<ApplicationRole>(new MyIdentityDb()));

var role = new ApplicationRole() { Name = name, ProperName = propername };
var result = await roleManager.CreateAsync(role);

But now we run into a problem when trying to get to the data. Example:

Our ViewModel:

public class IndexViewModel
{
    public IList<ApplicationUser> Users { get; set; }
    public IList<ApplicationRole> Roles { get; set; }
}

On our Controller:

private MyIdentityDb myIdentityDb = new MyIdentityDb();

Our Index method on our controller:

public ViewResult Index(int? page)
{
     return View(new IndexViewModel
     {
          Users = myIdentityDb.Users.ToList(),
          Roles = myIdentityDb.Roles.ToList()
     });
}

The error is on “myIdentityDb.Roles.ToList()” and reads “Cannot implicitly convert type System.Collection.Generic.List<Microsoft.AspNet.Identity.EntityFramework.IdentityRole> to System.Collections.Generic.IList<MyApp.Models.ApplicationRole>…

Of course we could change our ViewModel to use type IdentityRole like the following example, but then we cannot get to the new “ProperName” field in the AspNetRoles table:

public class IndexViewModel
{
    public IList<ApplicationUser> Users { get; set; }
    public IList<IdentityRole> Roles { get; set; }
}

So we could try creating another Db class and pass it an IdentityRole type instead of IdentityUser:

public class MyIdentityDb : IdentityDbContext<ApplicationUser>
{
    public MyIdentityDb()
        : base("MyIdentityDb")
    {
    }
}

public class MyIdentityRolesDb : IdentityDbContext<ApplicationRole>
{
    public MyIdentityRolesDb()
        : base("MyIdentityDb")
    {
    }
}

And change our controller:

private MyIdentityDb myIdentityDb = new MyIdentityDb();
private MyIdentityRolesDb myIdentityRolesDb = new MyIdentityRolesDb();

And change our Index method on our controller:

public ViewResult Index(int? page)
{
     return View(new IndexViewModel
     {
          Users = myIdentityDb.Users.ToList(),
          Roles = myIdentityRolesDb.Roles.ToList()
     });
}

But we end up with the same problem; the fact that IdentityDbContext takes an IdentityUser type.

Any ideas how we can get a list of Roles with the custom fields/properties?

Answer 1

Please take a look at the following article which explains in detail what you are trying to do http://typecastexception.com/post/2014/02/13/ASPNET-MVC-5-Identity-Extending-and-Modifying-Roles.aspx

Answer 2

So if you upgrade to the 2.0.0 beta packages, you should be able to get an IQueryable of ApplicationRole directly from the role manager:

roleManager.Roles

So you don't have to drop down to the DB context, this was a limitation in 1.0 that has been fixed in the 2.0 release.