Suppose we want to develop an application to manage the students of a college. To do this, we may need to create classes such as Student, Department, Address, etc. Technically, we called these classes Domain classes or business objects. Entity Framework Core uses a provider model to access many different databases. EF Core includes providers as NuGet packages which you need to install.

Consequently, professional developers prefer to work with data in a strongly-typed manner. Before .NET Framework 3.5, as a developer, we often wrote ADO.NET Code to perform CRUD operations with the underlying database. For this, we need to create a Connection Object with the database, then Open the Connection, Create the Command Object, and execute the Command using Data Reader or Data Adapter.

thoughts on “Entity Framework Tutorials For Begineers and Professionals”

It is open-source, lightweight, extensible and a cross-platform version of Entity Framework data access technology. These commands will create the initial database migration and apply it to your SQL Server instance. At this step, your appsettings.json must have your ConnectionString already.

It provides a connection between the business entity and data tables in the database. It saves data stored in the properties of business entities and also retrieves data from the database and converts it to business entities objects automatically. Entity Framework will execute the relevant query in the database and then materialize results into instances of your domain objects for you to work within your app. That means the Entity Framework eliminates the need to write the data-access code that developers usually need to write. Now your object directly works with the database to retrieve or make changes.

Step 1: Create a New .NET Core Project

It simplifies database interactions by allowing you to work with database objects as if they were regular C# objects. If you’re working on an existing project that already using EF6 or one that is linked to the .NET Framework, it’s still a good option to use EF 6. However, if you are developing new projects, particularly projects targeting .NET Core or .NET 5/6+, EF Core is the best choice. EF Core’s flexibility, performance improvements, and cross-platform capabilities make it the perfect selection for modern application development. entity framework meaning Core is an ORM Tool that increases the developer’s productivity by reducing the redundant task of doing CRUD operations against a database in a .NET Core Application.

• A third version of Entity Framework, version 4.1, was released on April 12, 2011, with Code First support.
• As a developer, we mostly work with data-driven applications, and the ORM Framework generates the necessary SQL (to perform the CRUD operation) that the underlying database can understand.
• Entity Framework is an open-source object-relational mapper framework for .NET applications supported by Microsoft.
• Entity Framework is an open-source ORM framework for .NET applications supported by Microsoft.
• As per the above figure, Entity Framework fits between the business entities (Domain Classes) and the database.
• This is a new technology for accessing the data for Microsoft application.

A third version of Entity Framework, version 4.1, was released on April 12, 2011, with Code First support. The following figure describes where the Entity Framework present in your application. Some people prefer to write all queries (Dapper) and some people prefer to work with LINQ (EF Core). The latest version of EF Core is now the recommended ORM for any new project over EF6. Pranaya Rout has published more than 3,000 articles in his 11-year career. In the next article, I will discuss How to Install the Entity Framework Core in ASP.NET Core Application using Visual Studio.

Entity Framework Tutorials For Begineers and Professionals

A refresh of version 4.1, named Entity Framework 4.1 Update 1, was released on July 25, 2011. An ORM (Object-Relational Mapper) is used to interact with a database using an object-oriented programming language. ORMs allow developers to work with databases using familiar, object-oriented concepts, rather than writing raw SQL statements. Entity Framework simplifies database operations and allows you to work with your data using C# objects. You can now build upon this foundation to create more complex database-driven applications with ease.

Prior to .NET 3.5, we (developers) often used to write ADO.NET code or Enterprise Data Access Block to save or retrieve application data from the underlying database. We used to open a connection to the database, create a DataSet to fetch or submit the data to the database, convert data from the DataSet to .NET objects or vice-versa to apply business rules. Microsoft has provided a framework called “Entity Framework” to automate all these database related activities for your application. Work still needs to be done to retrieve and map the data from the database to an instance of the domain object. However, as the domain model grows, the amount of code required can grow and will need more and more development time to maintain.

Step 2: Install Entity Framework Core

ORM tools increase developer productivity by reducing the redundant task of performing CRUD operations against a database in a .NET Application. The EF Core database provider usually contains the functionality specific to the database it supports. An ORM Framework like Entity Framework or EF Core can do all of the above for us and saves a lot of time if we provide the required information to the ORM Framework. The ORM Framework sits between our application code and the Database. It eliminates the need for most custom data-access codes we usually write without an ORM. Entity Framework (EF) Core is an ORM (Object-Relational Mapper) Framework for data access in .NET Core.

Both ORMs are great and work with any kind of project, from small-scale to massive enterprise-level applications. In this Entity Framework Tutorials Course using C#, I will discuss all the concepts of Entity Framework with Real-Time Examples. In this Entity Framework Tutorials article series, we will start from the very basics and, as we progress, cover all the intermediate and advanced features of Entity Framework as well. To take full advantage of this Entity Framework Core Tutorials, you should have the basic knowledge of C# and any database such as SQL Server, Oracle, or MySQL to gain more knowledge of these tutorials. Having .NET Core, Visual Studio, and SQL Server installed on your computer is good. The aim of the ORM is to increase the developer’s productivity by reducing the redundant task used in the application.

There are other ORMs in the marketplace, such as NHibernate and LLBL Gen Pro. Most ORMs typically map the type of the domain directly to the schema of the database. EF Core continues to support the following features and concepts, same as EF 6. It is an enhancement to ADO.NET that gives developers an automated mechanism for accessing & storing the data in the database. Entity Framework Core (EF Core) is an ORM (Object-Relational Mapping) framework for the .NET platform. In order to fully take advantage of this Entity Framework Course, you should have basic knowledge of C# and any database such as SQL Server, Oracle, or MySQL to learn more about these tutorials.

EF API translates LINQ-to-Entities queries to SQL queries for relational databases using EDM and also converts results back to entity objects. It uses EDM in building SQL queries from LINQ queries, building INSERT, UPDATE, and DELETE commands, and transform database result into entity objects. The Entity Framework Core is an updated and enhanced version of the Entity Framework designed for .NET Core applications. While the EF Core is relatively new and not as fully developed as the EF 6, it still supports its predecessor’s features and concepts.

EF Core mainly targets the code-first approach and provides little support for the database-first approach because the visual designer or wizard for DB model is not supported as of EF Core. The term ORM stands for Object-Relational Mapper, and it automatically creates classes based on database tables and vice versa is also true. It can also generate the necessary SQL to create the database based on the classes. As per the above figure, Entity Framework fits between the business entities (Domain Classes) and the database. It saves the data in the business properties entities and also retrieves the data from the database and converts it into the business entity’s object automatically.