将对模型所做的更改提交给数据库

Question

I had built a model which I made a controller (and by proxy a number of views for viewing, creating, deleting and editing records in the table created whenever I first browsed to the view via the controller in my web browser) out of using the wizard in Visual Studio.

This worked as expected, but then I made a change to my model, and tried the following steps to commit the changes to the database:

1. I deleted the controller
2. I deleted the View folder containing the various cshtml pages for creating/deleting/etc records
3. I used the server explorer pane in Visual Studio to delete the table from the database
4. I recreated the controller based on the model (and by proxy the various views)
5. I Saved All
6. I rebuilt my solution

After I carried out the above, I hit debug, and browsed to my controller, expecting the entity framework to re-create my table. Instead I got this error:

Invalid object name 'dbo.FooBar'. // FooBar is the name of my model, and therefore my table

A couple of questions:

1. What is the correct way to commit changes made to a model after the controllers/views/tables have all been created, and potentially have had changes made to them.
2. What can I do to fix my current situation?

Thanks

Answer 1

The two packages you want to use would be:

Automatic Migrations (EFMigrations)

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/adonet/archive/2012/02/09/ef-4-3-automatic-migrations-walkthrough.aspx

This Feature extends your Project with the ability to not only use code first, but also migrates changes made to your model to the database. I am using this in production since the minute it was out of beta.

MVC Scaffolding

http://blog.stevensanderson.com/2011/01/13/scaffold-your-aspnet-mvc-3-project-with-the-mvcscaffolding-package/

You can either download existing scaffolding templates to create views based on your model. These views are then automaticly updated if your model changes. Never got around to build my own templates, but heres a blog post from Scott Hanselman who Shows how to do that: http://www.hanselman.com/blog/ModifyingTheDefaultCodeGenerationscaffoldingTemplatesInASPNETMVC.aspx

Check out the talks from Steve Sanderson (Scaffolding) and Scott Hanselman (EF Migrations) on Channel9.