Linq one to many insert when many already exists
Question
So I'm new to linq so be warned what I'm doing may be completely stupid!
I've got a table of caseStudies and a table of Services with a many to many relasionship
the case studies already exist and I'm trying to insert a service whilst linking some case studies that already exist to it. I was presuming something like this would work?
Service service = new Service()
{
CreateDate = DateTime.Now,
CreatedBy = (from u in db.Users
where u.Id == userId
select u).Take(1).First(),
Description = description,
Title = title,
CaseStudies = (from c in db.CaseStudies
where c.Name == caseStudy
select c),
Icon = iconFile,
FeatureImageGroupId = imgGroupId,
UpdateDate = DateTime.Now,
UpdatedBy = (from u in db.Users
where u.Id == userId
select u).Take(1).First()
};
But This isn't correct as it complains about
Cannot implicitly convert type 'System.Linq.IQueryable' to 'System.Data.Objects.DataClasses.EntityCollection'
Can somebody please show me the correct way.
Thanks in advance
Solution
Yo have to add the query result to the case studies collection instead of trying to replace it.
var service = new Service { ... };
foreach (var caseStudy in db.CaseStudies.Where(s => s.Name == caseStudyName)
{
service.CaseStudies.Add(caseStudy);
}
You can wrap this in an extension method and get a nice syntax.
public static class ExtensionMethods
{
public static void AddRange<T>(this EntityCollection<T> entityCollection,
IEnumerable<T> entities)
{
// Add sanity checks here.
foreach (T entity in entities)
{
entityCollection.Add(entity);
}
}
}
And now you get the following.
var service = new Service { ... };
service.CaseStudies.AddRange(db.CaseStudies.Where(s => s.Name == caseStudyName));