Repository + UnitOfWork pattern for entity framework

Question

I was searching the net up and down and I didn't manage to find a suitable design for my application.
I am looking for Repository+UnitOfWork pattern that will manage connections and dispose them automatically when done.

I need to support both web application where each request will have its own UnitOfWork and windows application where each thread will have its own UnitOfWork. I need the patters to dispose automatically the UnitOfWork whrn request/thread is done. I also would like to support rolback in case of exception.

Right now I use StructureMap so I don't care to continue use it in the suggest answers.

The reason I need Repository pattern is to achieve all the abilities I need to all my entities. The reason I need UnitOfWork is to allow changes in more then one entity.

I will really appriciate any help.

Thanks.

Answer 1

I used this blog as a really good starting point:

http://www.primaryobjects.com/CMS/Article122.aspx

It starts at the VERY beginning, and provides source code at the end for you. It also uses StructureMap, so it might be somewhat familiar to you.

Answer 2

I would recommend the NCommon framework. You can find a blog about it here: http://www.codeinsanity.com/

Answer 3

I wrote an article last year about writing LINQ enabled repositories that can be faked easily for unit testing and works well with dependency injection. Here is the article. In short the article describes a unit of work that mimics the LINQ to SQL DataContext and wraps an IDataMapper interface that abstracts the actual O/RM tool. The unit of work contains properties of type Repository<TEntity> such as Repository<Customer> or Repository<Order> and the repository class implements IQueryable<T>, which allows you to LINQ over it.

The IDataMapper is a simple interface that looks like this:

public interface IDataMapper : IDisposable
{
    Repository<T> GetRepository<T>() where T : class;

    void Save();
}

The solution described in the article is designed to be unit test friendly and DI friendly. In fact, the only configuration you need is the following:

string northwindConnection = GetConStr("Northwind");

container.RegisterSingle<IUnitOfWorkFactory<NorthwindUnitOfWork>>(
    new LinqToSqlNorthwindUnitOfWorkFactory(northwindConnection));

container.RegisterSingle<IUnitOfWorkFactory<SalesUnitOfWork>>(
    new EntityFrameworkSalesUnitOfWorkFactory());

Answer 4

If you already have unit of work and repositories and you are using StructureMap so where is the problem?

You can simply configure your classes as:

ObjectFactory.Configure(x => x.For<IUnitOfWork>()
                              .HybridHttpOrThreadLocalScoped()
                              .Use<EFUnitOfWork>());

And you can use dependency injection to pass unit of work to repositories.