Mixing CLR Types and Artificial Properties

This article is relevant to entity models that utilize the deprecated Visual Studio integration of Telerik Data Access. The current documentation of the Data Access framework is available here.

The purpose of this tutorial is to show you how to add artificial properties to CLR types.

The following example shows how to create two additional artificial properties (Age and Picture) for the Person class. First, you need to create a new instance of the generic MappingConfiguration<T> class, by using the Person class. Next, use the well-known HasArtificialPrimitiveProperty<T>, HasArtificialStringProperty and HasArtificialProperty<T> methods.

All methods for configuring artificial types are located in the Telerik.OpenAccess.Metadata.Fluent.Artificial namespace.

In the following example, two additional properties Age and Picture are added to the Person type.

public class FluentModelMetadataSource : FluentMetadataSource
{
   protected override IList<MappingConfiguration> PrepareMapping()
   {
       List<MappingConfiguration> configurations = new List<MappingConfiguration>();
       MappingConfiguration<Person> personConfiguraiton = new MappingConfiguration<Person>();
       personConfiguraiton.MapType( p => new
       {
           PersonId = p.Id,
           LastName = p.LastName,
           FirstName = p.FirstName,
           Contact = p.Address
       } ).ToTable( "People" );
       personConfiguraiton.HasProperty( p => p.Id ).IsIdentity( KeyGenerator.Autoinc );

       personConfiguraiton.HasArtificialPrimitiveProperty<int>( "Age" );
       personConfiguraiton.HasArtificialProperty<byte[]>( "Picture" );

       configurations.Add( personConfiguraiton );
       return configurations;
   }
}

Public Class FluentModelMetadataSource
    Inherits FluentMetadataSource
    Protected Overrides Function PrepareMapping() As IList(Of MappingConfiguration)
        Dim configurations As New List(Of MappingConfiguration)()
        Dim personConfiguraiton As New MappingConfiguration(Of Person)()
        personConfiguraiton.MapType(Function(p) New With {Key .PersonId = p.Id,
                                                          Key .LastName = p.LastName,
                                                          Key .FirstName = p.FirstName,
                                                          Key .Contact = p.Address}).ToTable("People")
        personConfiguraiton.HasProperty(Function(p) p.Id).IsIdentity(KeyGenerator.Autoinc)
        personConfiguraiton.FieldNamingRules.AddPrefix = "_"

        personConfiguraiton.HasArtificialPrimitiveProperty(Of Integer)("Age")
        personConfiguraiton.HasArtificialProperty(Of Byte())("Picture")

        configurations.Add(personConfiguraiton)
        Return configurations
    End Function
End Class

Person Class

public class Person
{
   public int Id {get;set;}
   public string FirstName {get;set;}
   public string LastName {get;set;}
   public string Address {get;set;}
}

Public Class Person
    Private _id As Integer
    Public Property Id() As Integer
        Get
            Return _id
        End Get
        Set(ByVal value As Integer)
            _id = value
        End Set
    End Property

    Private _firstName As String
    Public Property FirstName() As String
        Get
            Return _firstName
        End Get
        Set(ByVal value As String)
            _firstName = value
        End Set
    End Property

    Private _lastName As String
    Public Property LastName() As String
        Get
            Return _lastName
        End Get
        Set(ByVal value As String)
            _lastName = value
        End Set
    End Property

    Private _address As String
    Public Property Address() As String
        Get
            Return _address
        End Get
        Set(ByVal value As String)
            _address = value
        End Set
    End Property
End Class