Frequently Asked .netSavant Questions

These facts about .netSavant have been compiled to better support any issues or questions you may have about the .netSavant code generation platform. If there is any information that you'd like to see posted here, please contact us and we'll update this page.

General

What is .netSavant?

.netSavant is a Visual Studio.NET Add-In that generates .net 2.0 compliant source code for both the C# and VB.NET programming languages. Its main use is to generate adapter objects for stored procedures and inline sql statements that encapsulate the complexities and ADO.NET code necessary for statement execution. These adapters provide a simple object oriented way to deal with the execution of database statements.

Last Updated: 2/23/2008

How long will it take me to learn to use .netSavant?

A typical developer will get up and running with .netSavant within a few minutes and become fluent with the statement adapter design generated for database statements within a few hours. Additionally, the other code generation options utilize Visual Studio.NET context sensitive menus that are extremely intuitive to use.

Last Updated: 2/23/2008

Can I change how .netSavant formats the code that is generated?

Not directly. All code generated by .netSavant uses Visual Studio.NET smart formatting to format the code according to your Visual Studio settings. If you want .netSavant to format the generated code differently you can simply change the smart format settings within Visual Studio.

Last Updated: 2/23/2008

Why doesn't .netSavant work with versions of Visual Studio older than 2005?

The code generated by .netSavant, most notably the data access layer leverage many features of the .NET 2.0 framework.

Last Updated: 2/23/2008

Code Generation - Data Access Adapters

Why do the base classes for the data access layer accept so many generic arguments?

The data access layer used by .netSavant is designed to support multiple data providers. Currently only SQL Server is supported but an Oracle provider is in the works.

Last Updated: 2/23/2008

How does ExecuteEnumerator() work?

When generating adapters for statements that generate columnar output several methods are created in order to execute the statement. One of them, ExecuteEnumerator() internally uses an efficient yield loop to return records as IEnumerable. Most likely 95%+ of your statement execution should use this method to return records to your application. The only cases where this method is not appropriate is when your statement returns data types that are not exposed by the Get* methods of the DbDataRecord object contained by the generic IEnumerable interface. Typically these scenarios occur when returning binary or UDT data types.

Last Updated: 2/23/2008

How do I retrieve results that contain binary data?

The method for retrieving binary data is best outlined by reviewing the samples in our example code page.

Last Updated: 2/23/2008

Does .netSavant support user defined types?

.netSavant does not currently support UDT data types. Plans are underway to provide this functionality in a future release, however demand for UDT support has not been high. Currently when a UDT is encountered by the code generation system code is inserted into the adapter that will throw an exception in the place where you can custom program the handling of your UDT type. Simply locate this exception code and replace it with your custom UDT programming.

Last Updated: 2/23/2008

Why are all of the value type properties for an adapter nullable?

Parameters in most databases, SQL Server in particular, allow null values to be sent into a parameter through the use of the System.DBNull type. In turn, these parameters can then map to nullable columns in the database. With the advent of .net 2.0 we now have a simple way to map nullable types to their nullable counterparts in a database structure. I've written an extensive blog article "nullable types and ado.net parameters" on this topic that you can review; it is far more detailed than what is practical to place into a FAQ entry.

Last Updated: 2/23/2008

Why do the adapters expose public column name ordinal position constants?

These constants can be used when retrieving columnar data from the execution of a statement. The Get* methods of the data provider readers (such as SqlDataReader, DbDataReader or DbDataRecord) and the column positions in data tables all accept ordinal position as arguments for retrieving data. The constants provide a simple named method for providing a columnar ordinal position. They also provide more robust handling for column position refactoring and adapter regeneration; if the column position changes and code is regenerated the ordinal position constant will have its value changed automatically while preserving any code that you have written that uses the constant.

Last Updated: 2/23/2008

Can multiple adapters participate in a single transaction?

Absolutely! Each adapter has three constructors specified. A default constructor, one that accepts a connection object and another that accepts a transaction object. Generally you'll use the constructor that accepts a connection, however when the adapter needs to run within the context of a transaction you can simply create a transaction object and pass it into the constructor of each adapter that will participate. Additionally, each adapter also has an AttachConnection() and AttachTransaction() method that can be used with the default constructor.

Last Updated: 2/23/2008

How do I create an inline SQL statement and create an adapter for it?

When viewing the adapter generation window you'll have a tree of servers > databases > procedures on the left. Simply right click on a database and select "add inline statement" (only available when a solution is active in visual studio). This will launch a window that will allow you to build a parameterized SQL statement as well as create the parameters that go along with the statement. This inline statement is persisted to an XML file stored in the same directory as your solution allowing you to apply version control to the file.

Last Updated: 2/23/2008

Code Generation - CLR Interface Implementation

Why does .netSavant implement these interfaces when I can code them myself?

.netSavant creates best practice implementations of common .NET interfaces. The interface for creating this code streamlines the implementation, reduces potential errors and ensures that the implementation is fully documented.

Last Updated: 2/23/2008

Why are there no documentation comments for the VB.NET interface implementations?

There is an issue with visual studio that prevents comments from being removed when methods are removed during a refactoring (overwrite existing methods) event. Unfortunately we do not have a viable work around that will allow us to support doc comments for VB.NET.

Last Updated: 2/23/2008

How do I generate the CLR interface implementations?

Simply right click inside of a class definition in a class file and you'll see a new menu item, Code Generation. There are three sub-menu items that will launch a simple form that will allow you to easily implement each of the supported interfaces. If you need to make changes to an interfaces' implementation simply go through the process a second or third time and .netSavant will re-generate the code for you.

Last Updated: 2/23/2008

Frequently Asked .netSavant Questions

General

Code Generation - Data Access Adapters

Code Generation - CLR Interface Implementation

Product Overview