Boolean types with entity framework code first and oracle provider

Question

Working in a application that has to work in oracle and sqlServer. In SqlServer we have used "Bit" to store booleans and in oracle number(1).
Have check other threads in this forum, but didnt find any that fix my problem, sorry if this may have been discused before.
We have created a code first model were we find few bool properties mapped to database fields.
for example:
public partial class ZPruebaBooleano
public int Numero { get; set; }
public bool Booleano { get; set; }
Mapped as:
this.ToTable("ZPRUEBABOOLEANO", schema);
this.HasKey<int>(t => t.Numero);
this.Property(t => t.Numero).HasColumnName("NUMERO");
this.Property(t => t.Booleano).HasColumnName("BOOLEANO");
Also, sw added to the application configuration file (for simplicity we have test it without the use of any additional dll):
<oracle.dataaccess.client>
<settings>
<add name="bool" value="edmmapping number(1,0)" />
<add name="byte" value="edmmapping number(3,0)" />
<add name="int16" value="edmmapping number(4,0)" />
<add name="int32" value="edmmapping number(9,0)" />
<add name="int64" value="edmmapping number(18,0)" />
</settings>
</oracle.dataaccess.client>
I am confident that the provider factory read it when creating the model, because it provokes an exception if i add an invalid entry in any of the type names mapped in the file.
As i have find in other forums, this should work. But now i am not sure if should work always, including code first.
I have this exception when i excecute the code (translated from spanish, sorry for any mistake):
Type 'Edm.Boolean[Nullable=False,DefaultValue=]' from 'Booleano' to type'PruebaBooleanos.ZPruebaBooleano' is not compatyble with 'OracleEFProvider.number[Nullable=False,DefaultValue=,Precision=38,Scale=0]'
Its funy that says Precision=38. The database is Number(1), i am sure about that, in fact this is the script:
CREATE TABLE ZPRUEBABOOLEANO
NUMERO NUMBER(15),
BOOLEANO NUMBER(1)
Also, i find it interesting that i was having this mistake even when i was not informing the table i was maping, like if the oracle provider didnt even check if the column was number(anything). Right now is well maped, table and schema.
I have test to create an integer property wrapped by the boolean one, as we can see in this code.
namespace PruebaBooleanos
public partial class ZPruebaBooleano
public int Numero { get; set; }
public bool Booleano
get
return iBooleano == 1 ? true : false;
set
iBooleano = value ? 1 : 0;
public int iBooleano { get; set; }
in this last case i ignored the boolean and mapped the integer.
That worked ok in oracle. But added 2 problems:
1. It fails in SqlServer, because in sql server is bit
2. Cant query the entity model using the boolean property as it is not maped to Database.
I could change the bit field in SqlServer to Number.
But i would like to keep bit in sqlserver and number(1) in oracle.
Anyone had a similar problem?
I am open to any ideas, thanks !!!
libo

Answer 1

It's cool. :)
Sure. I can upload an EDMX file that works against my database if you want to look at it. The relevant parts are probably much like you'd expect. I've removed some columns from this version to make it easier to read.
From the SSDL:
        <EntityType Name="PARAMETER">
          <Key>
            <PropertyRef Name="PARAMETER_CD" />
          </Key>
          <Property Name="PARAMETER_CD" Type="number" Nullable="false" Precision="4" />
          <Property Name="PARAMETER_ACTIVE_INDR" Type="number" Nullable="false" Precision="1" />
        </EntityType>From the CSDL:
<EntityType Name="PARAMETER">
          <Key>
            <PropertyRef Name="PARAMETER_CD" />
          </Key>
          <Property Type="Int16" Name="PARAMETER_CD" Nullable="false" />
          <Property Type="Boolean" Name="PARAMETER_ACTIVE_INDR" Nullable="false" />
        </EntityType>From the C-S mapping:
<EntitySetMapping Name="PARAMETER">
            <EntityTypeMapping TypeName="Model.PARAMETER">
              <MappingFragment StoreEntitySet="PARAMETER">
                <ScalarProperty Name="PARAMETER_ACTIVE_INDR" ColumnName="PARAMETER_ACTIVE_INDR" />
                <ScalarProperty Name="PARAMETER_CD" ColumnName="PARAMETER_CD" />
              </MappingFragment>
            </EntityTypeMapping>
          </EntitySetMapping>Also worth noting that the EDMX mapper probably won't set the provider and token correctly:
<Schema Namespace="Model.Store" Alias="Self" Provider="Oracle.DataAccess.Client" ProviderManifestToken="11.2" xmlns:store="http://schemas.microsoft.com/ado/2007/12/edm/EntityStoreSchemaGenerator" xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/ado/2009/02/edm/ssdl">Full version is available at http://www.hiredgoons.ca/DataImport.edmx . This is an early development one so I make no apologies for not renaming columns to something readable. ;) It does work correctly as I've had it in testing (taking data from a 170MB excel file and putting it into Oracle using the model). It was created using DB First.
When you have it load at runtime, you need the application configuration settings to map bool to number(1). If that's in app.config or web.config it'll pick it up. Probably worth noting that if you don't have the configuration setting and you load this, the model doesn't validate correctly. As soon as you try to create a DbContext from it, you get an immediate exception that number(1) doesn't map to boolean.
Edited by: Tridus on Nov 21, 2012 3:37 PM