Best way to access a SQL Server database using C# .Net

Question

I am new to .NET and have heard about several different ways of querying a SQL Server databse such as ADO.NET and the entity framework.

Can anyone give me some advis

Answer 1

Here is an example using EF with code generation from the database (for a real app you probably want to generate your DB from the code, instead):

1. Right click on your project >> Add >> New Item >> ADO.NET Entity Data Model.
2. Pick a name for your entities i.e. MyEntities.edmx, click Next
3. Select "Generate from database"
4. Configure a 'New Connection' if there is not one already there. Next.
5. Select the Tables, Views, and SPROCs you want included in the entities. Finish.

You will see a file MyEntities.edmx added to your project. You can open it in design view to see a diagram of your entities and relationships. Note that each entity should have a primary key - the easiest way to do this is to add an ID - auto increment field to each table, or a GUID column. Anyway now you can query your db like this:

// assuming a "Product" table, which has an entity pluralized to "Products"

MyEntities db = new MyEntities();

var cheapProducts = db.Products.Where(p => p.Price > 30); // var is IEnumerable