Working with NHibernate 3.0

4

Using LINQ to NHibernate

In the previous chapter, the ICritera API, a programmatic method of data retrieval, was discussed. Recall that the ICriteria interface contains the QueryOver API, which is a type-safe compile-time wrapper for the ICriteria API. It is possible to use lambda expressions in both QueryOver and LINQ to NHibernate. In this chapter, you will learn the following:

• Working with LINQ to NHibernate
• Using LINQ to NHibernate with lambda expressions
• Implementing paging using LINQ to NHibernate
• Understanding aggregate database functions with LINQ to NHibernate

INTRODUCTION

The release of NHibernate 3.0 included LINQ capabilities for use with NHibernate. LINQ is a very powerful querying tool that exists for objects, SQL, XML, and many other extensions for querying information sources. The LINQ to NHibernate provider implements most of the .NET LINQ operators found in the System.Linq namespace. Table 4-1 shows the operator types and execution method(s) provided with the LINQ to NHibernate provider.

TABLE 4-1:LINQ Operators

OPERATOR	EXECUTION METHODS
Aggregates	Count, Sum, Min, Max, and Average
Conversion	ToArray, ToList, ToDictionary, and OfType
Element	First, FirstOrDefault, ElementAt
Generation	Range, and Repeat
Grouping	GroupBy
Join	Cross, Group, and Left Outer
Ordering	OrderBy, OrderByDescending, ThenBy, ThenByDescending, and Reverse
Partitioning	Take, Skip, TakeWhile, and SkipWhile
Projection	Select and SelectMany
Quantifiers	Any and ...