About MVC Applications

Question

Hi all I am new in MVC. I want to know why we are using Entity framework here instead of Ado.net?Another question is is it possible to view the design mode in MVC without running the application(like in Asp.net)?

Sharon Hoffman · Answer

First I would like to point out that Entity Framework has nothing specific to do with ASP.NET MVC. You can actually use it anywhere that you have previously used ADO.NET. Now the question is why would you use EF and why it is generally more preferred then ADO.NET? There are quite a few reasons but to keep it simple  EF sits on top of ADO.NET and what it does it is abstracts the database communication in a way that it represents the databases tables and their relationships with a corresponding classes and the relationships between those classes. So essentially what it does is it provides you a set of classes called entities with which you manipulate in very OOP programmers friendly manner. This results in increased readability maintainability and in reduced development time. Also in case you are interested you can find a more technical comparison between them on this SO answer . Also you should note that regardless of how comfortable you feel with SQL queries developers just prefer more the ORM approach because it is less error prone. Also as an FYI you can try out these SQL coding tests and let me know how good you are ;)

Vincent Maverick Durano · Answer

As already stated by the member above MVC is not all about EF of course you can still use your plain ADO.NET with MVC . EF is just an ORM (object-relational mapper) that enables you to work with relational data using domain-specific objects. Since MVC uses Model then it make sense to use EF as your data model. Regarding your 2nd question No. Unlike in WebForms MVC doesn't have a designer for you to be able to preview your UI.

Gowtham Rajamanickam · Answer

right-click a .cshtml and select preview in browser.

pritaeas · Answer

You are not required to use Entity it is just a framework to help you work with the database. You can right-click a .cshtml and select preview in browser.