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manoj
manoj

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EF Code-First Approach

Entity Framework is the Microsoft preferred method of data access for .NET applications. It supports strongly-typed access through LINQ. Entity Framework also allows developers to program against a conceptual model that reflects application logic rather than a relational model that reflects the database structure.

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Code First Approach

The Code First Approach provides an alternative to the Database First and Model First approaches to the Entity Data Model and creates a database for us based on our classes.

Code-First Workflow

The following figure illustrates the code-first development workflow.

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The development workflow in the code-first approach would be: Create or modify domain classes -> configure these domain classes using Fluent-API or data annotation attributes -> Create or update the database schema using automated migration or code-based migration.

The Code-First approach also requires a context class which should be derived from DbContext class. Create a context class as shown below. It derives from DBContext class and exposes DbSet properties for the types that you want to be part of the model.

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