In Which We Painlessly Scope the Lifespan of the Entity Framework Context

In the previous post of this pair, we covered where non-barbarian (and non-physicist) developers can hook their business logic code when using the ADO.NET Entity Framework. To round out the set, we will A the frequently-asked Q of when we should instantiate the ObjectContext, and when we should run it out to the curb for the GC. IMHO AFAIK. LOL.

ObjectContext != DbConnection

If you are coming at the Entity Framework from an old-timey ADO.NET perspective, you might align the idea of a data context ...

In Which We Take Care of Business with the Entity Framework

There are few phases of application development that I want to have done with faster than running plumbing from the database. Some of us, bless the cockles of their tiny hearts, live in ORM-land and love it. As for me, I'll take the path of least resistance every time with regard to this drudgery, because I have features to code and a user interface to build. And at the moment, the path of least resistance means using the ADO.NET Entity Framework.

The Entity Framework does a bang-up ...

Earlier this evening, I had the privilege of collaborating with my teammate Brock in presenting highlights from Visual Studio 2010 and .NET 4 to our fellow Aptera developers. After Brock brought the house down with his overview of new language features and a deep-dive into 2010's outrageous Historical Debugging feature, I brought the team up to date on the wonders of modern Parallel Programming using the Tasks Parallel Library and PLINQ.

If you wish to perform a closer examination of them, you may download my materials from the talk here. This archive contains:

• The Powerpoint Presentation
• Full source ...

Is Parallel.ForEach the New Black?

The forthcoming release of version 4 of the .NET CLR includes quite a few spiffing features, from Background Garbage Collection and Historical Debugging to Auto-Implemented Properties and underscore-free line breaks in VB. But perhaps one of the more head-turning items is the new Task Parallel Library (formerly known as the Parallel Framework Extensions, or PFX), and its prominent representative, the System.Threading.Tasks.Parallel class.

If this is the first you are hearing of this new Parallel framework, put down whatever you are drinking, because you'll only end up spit-taking it all over your bulky off-white ...