Bringing ActiveRecord to the party

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In order to explorer some more realistics scenarios you will face in daily developments, why not use ActiveRecord as our database access approach?

All you have to do is reference the assemblies, set up a database and configure and initialize ActiveRecord:

First of all, add references to the following assemblies:
- Castle.ActiveRecord.dll
- Castle.DynamicProxy.dll
- Iesi.Collections.dll
- log4net.dll
- NHibernate.dll

Now include a section on the web.config so you can keep ActiveRecord's configuration there:


<configuration>
    <configSections>
        <section 
            name="monorail" 
            type="Castle.MonoRail.Framework.Configuration.MonoRailSectionHandler, Castle.MonoRail.Framework" />
        <section 
            name="activerecord"
            type="Castle.ActiveRecord.Framework.Config.ActiveRecordSectionHandler, Castle.ActiveRecord" />
    </configSections>
    
    <activerecord isWeb="true">
        
        <config>
            <add 
                key="hibernate.connection.driver_class" 
                value="NHibernate.Driver.SqlClientDriver" />
            <add 
                key="hibernate.dialect"                 
                value="NHibernate.Dialect.MsSql2000Dialect" />
            <add 
                key="hibernate.connection.provider"     
                value="NHibernate.Connection.DriverConnectionProvider" />
            <add 
                key="hibernate.connection.connection_string" 
                value="Data Source=.;Initial Catalog=test;Integrated Security=SSPI" />
        </config>
        
    </activerecord>

Quick Note

The configuration above uses SQL Server 2000. If you are using a different database you need to change the dialect. Please refer to the Xml Configuration Reference document for more information.

This configuration access a database catalog named test. Make sure it exists or change the configuration to access an existing database catalog.

Create two models to represent products and suppliers. You can create the classes on the Models folders

The Supplier.cs:


namespace GettingStartedSample.Models
{
    using System;
    using Castle.ActiveRecord;
    using NHibernate.Expression;

    [ActiveRecord]
    public class Supplier : ActiveRecordBase
    {
        private int id;
        private String name;

        [PrimaryKey]
        public int Id
        {
            get { return id; }
            set { id = value; }
        }

        [Property]
        public string Name
        {
            get { return name; }
            set { name = value; }
        }
        
        /// <summary>
        /// Returns the Suppliers ordered by Name
        /// </summary>
        /// <returns>Suppliers array</returns>
        public static Supplier[] FindAll()
        {
            return (Supplier[]) FindAll(typeof(Supplier), new Order[] { Order.Asc("Name") });
        }
    }
}

The Product.cs:


namespace GettingStartedSample.Models
{
    using System;
    using Castle.ActiveRecord;

    [ActiveRecord]
    public class Product : ActiveRecordBase
    {
        private int id;
        private String name;
        private decimal price;
        private Supplier supplier;

        [PrimaryKey]
        public int Id
        {
            get { return id; }
            set { id = value; }
        }

        [Property]
        public string Name
        {
            get { return name; }
            set { name = value; }
        }

        [Property]
        public decimal Price
        {
            get { return price; }
            set { price = value; }
        }

        [BelongsTo("SupplierId")]
        public Supplier Supplier
        {
            get { return supplier; }
            set { supplier = value; }
        }
        
        public static Product[] FindAll()
        {
            return (Product[]) FindAll(typeof(Product));
        }
        
        public static Product FindById(int id)
        {
            return (Product) FindByPrimaryKey(typeof(Product), id);
        }
    }
}

The last step is to initialize ActiveRecord passing the configuration. The best place to do that in a web application is on the global.asax related class. So create a global.asax if none exists and on the related class, use the Application_OnStart event to initialize ActiveRecord:

The global.asax file:


<%@ Application Inherits="GettingStartedSample.GlobalApplication" %>

The GlobalApplication.cs file:


namespace GettingStartedSample
{
    using System;
    using System.Web;
    using Castle.ActiveRecord;
    using Castle.ActiveRecord.Framework.Config;
    using GettingStartedSample.Models;
    

    public class GlobalApplication : HttpApplication
    {
        public GlobalApplication()
        {
        }

        public void Application_OnStart()
        {
            ActiveRecordStarter.Initialize(ActiveRecordSectionHandler.Instance, 
                                           new Type[] { typeof(Supplier), typeof(Product) });
            
            // If you want to let ActiveRecord create the schema for you:
            ActiveRecordStarter.CreateSchema();
        }

        public void Application_OnEnd() 
        {
        }
    }
}

The next time you run the application it will create the tables for you, so you can comment the line that invokes CreateSchema after that.

In the following pages we will have some fun using scaffolding and creating CRUD pages.

Proceed with Using ActiveRecord Scaffolding.

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Bringing ActiveRecord to the party