The information in this post is out of date.

Visit msdn.com/data/ef for the latest information on current and past releases of EF.

For EF Power Tools see http://msdn.com/data/jj593170

 

Last month we announced the RTW of Entity Framework 4.1 (Magic Unicorn Edition). As we worked on the EF 4.1 release we had a series of Community Technology Previews (CTPs) and it was great to have consistent feedback coming in from you all. So, with EF 4.1 released we thought it was time to get some more pre-release stuff in your hands…

Today we are releasing a preview of some Power Tools for EF 4.1 that integrate with Visual Studio. This first preview of the EF Power Tools is focused on providing design-time tools for Code First development.

 

Where Do I Get It?

EF Power Tools CTP1 is available on the Visual Studio Gallery 

You can also install the power tools directly from Visual Studio by selecting ‘Tools –> Extension Manager…’ then searching for “Entity Framework Power Tools” in the Online Gallery.

 

Support?

This release is a preview of features that we are considering for a future release and is designed to allow you to provide feedback on the design of these features. EF Power Tools CTP1 is not intended or licensed for use in production. If you have questions please use the “Q & A” tab on the Entity Framework Power Tools Visual Studio Gallery page.

What Does It Add To Visual Studio?

EF Power Tools CTP1 is focused on Code First development and adds some options to context menus in Visual Studio:

When right-clicking on a C# project an ‘Entity Framework’ sub-menu is added:

ProjectMenu

  • Reverse Engineer Code First
    This command allows one time generation of Code First to an existing database. This option is useful if you want to use Code First to target an existing database as it takes care of a lot of the initial coding. The command prompts for a connection to an existing database and then reverse engineers POCO classes, a derived DbContext and Code First mappings that can be used to access the database.
    • You will need to have EF 4.1 installed or have added the EntityFramework NuGet package to your project before running reverse engineer.
    • The reverse engineer process currently produces a complete mapping using the fluent API. Items such as column name will always be configured, even when they would be correctly inferred by conventions. This allows you to refactor property/class names etc. without needing to manually update the mapping.
      • In the future we may look at options that allow only minimal mapping to be generated along with the option to use Data Annotations for mapping rather than the fluent API. We would really like to hear you feedback on this. 
    • A connection string is added to the App/Web.config file and is used by the context at runtime. If you are reverse engineering to a class library you will need to copy this connection string to the App/Web.config file of the consuming application(s).
    • This process is designed to help with the initial coding of a Code First model. You may need to adjust the generated code if you have a complex database schema or are using advanced database features.
    • Running this command multiple times will overwrite any previously generated files, including any changes that have been made to generated files.
When right-clicking on a file containing a derived DbContext class an ‘Entity Framework’ sub-menu is added:

ItemMenu

  • View Entity Data Model (Read-only)
    Displays the Code First model in the Entity Framework designer.
    • This is a read-only representation of the model, you can not update the Code First model using the designer.
  • View Entity Data Model XML
    Displays the EDMX XML representing the Code First model.
  • View Entity Data Model DDL SQL
    Displays the DDL SQL to create the database targeted by the Code First model.
  • Optimize Entity Data Model
    Generates pre-compiled views used by the EF runtime to improve start-up performance. Adds the generated views file to the containing project.
    • View compilation is discussed in the Performance Considerations article on MSDN.
    • If you change your Code First model then you will need to re-generate the pre-compiled views by running this command again.

 

Where Are Enums/Spatial/Migrations/…?

Our team is working on many new features including the ones mentioned above. This power tools preview is just one of a series of previews we have planned as we work on the next release. Rest assured, we appreciate that these are very important features and we will be reaching out for your feedback on them.

 

Andrew Peters & Rowan Miller
ADO.NET Entity Framework