DevForce 2010 Formatting Dates for EntityQuery - c#

I've run into a situation where I need to query by Date and Time. I'm trying to write an EntityQuery where the date and time are in the same format. The query below returns no rows. However if I remove the two date clauses, rows are returned and then I can check the dates looping through the results. I would prefer to use the dates in the query.
the variable ap in the query is a C# object
var query = from log in Manager.Logs
where log.StartDttm == ap.StartDttm
&& log.EndDttm == ap.EndDttm
&& log.TypeId == 1
select log;
I came up with this workaround to query between midnight and 11:59:59pm for each date. I don't like this either, but this does at least reduce the number of rows returned by the query.
var query = from log in Manager.Logs
where && log.StartDttm >= ap.StartDttmQueryBegin
&& log.StartDttm <= ap.StartDttmQueryEnd
&& log.EndDttm >= ap.EndDttmQueryBegin
&& log.EndDttm <= ap.EndDttmQueryEnd
&& log.TypeId == 1
select log;

DevForce doesn't expect any specific date/time formats or modify them when the query is built and executed, but it's not the date format per se but the precision of the data stored in the database vs. the precision of the DateTime fields in the "ap" object which is causing the issue.
In EF you can use the EntityFunctions and/or SQLFunctions APIs to perform date/time truncating/formatting, but these are difficult to use in DevForce due to the client/server serialization and EntityQuery to ObjectQuery conversion that DevForce performs. These APIs can be made to work on the "server side" of DevForce via an RPC call.
Your workaround, although it may feel cumbersome, is probably your best option. You could also try calling a stored procedure or using an ESQL passthru query, both of which will give you a little more control over the resulting SQL query.

Related

Using Where clause for DateTime field using a LINQ statement

I am trying to return records for users based on their telephone numbers as well as a restriction to the PolicyEnd Field (DateTime Format) to return only those that are greater than or equal to 2022. However, I keep on running into several errors:
&& DateTime.ParseExact(s: ti0.Outer.Inner.PolicyEnd,format: "yyy-MM-dd",provider: __InvariantCulture_0) > DateTime.Now)' could not be translated.
var QUERY = from client in _ipacontext.Inclients
join policy in _ipacontext.Inpolicies on client.ClientId equals policy.AccountNo
join types in _ipacontext.InpolicyTypes on policy.PolicyType equals types.TypeId
where client.Telephone2 == "0000000" && DateTime.ParseExact(policy.PolicyEnd, "yyy-MM-dd", CultureInfo.InvariantCulture) > 2022
I have also tried this below but in vain :
where client.Telephone2 == "000000" && Convert.ToDateTime(policy.PolicyEnd).Year >=2022
An example of the Date Format is as below:
2022-08-31 00:00:00.000
Any help on other workarounds?
Dates have no format, they're binary types in all databases (except SQLite). SQL Server has date, datetime2, datetimeoffset, time and the legacy datetime for storing dates and time-of-day. Storing dates as strings in a string field is a critical bug that must be fixed. There's no way to control what goes into a string field, which means it's quite easy for garbage or strings with the wrong format to end up in the database.
Trying to parse such strings will result in bad performance and increased blocking even if indexes are used. Indexes are built using the stored values, not function results. Trying to parse PolicyEnd and filter by a specific date would have to scan the entire table, parse the values and only then decide which values to include. It will take Shared locks on the entire table while doing so, which would block any UPDATE or DELETE calls that tried to run at the same time, even if they were outside the date range.
If the field uses a date type, the PolicyEnd property should be a DateTime. In that casefiltering to find all dates after 2022 would be just :
var fromDate=new DateTime(2023,1,1);
var query = ....
where client.Telephone2 == "000000"
&& policy.PolicyEnd >=fromDate
This will result in a parameterized query that can use any indexes covering PolicyEnd to only touch policy rows whose PolicyEnd value matches the criteria.
The JOINs aren't necessary either. It's EF's job to generate the JOINs from the relations between entities. A Client should have a Policies collection. A Policy should have a PolicyType. A LINQ query that returns clients without a second phone whose policies end in the future should be :
var clients=from client in _context.Clients
from policy in client.Policies
where client.Telephone2 == "000000"
&& policy.PolicyEnd >=fromDate
select ...;
Since your db table column format datetime, just try to use function
var dt = new DateTime(2022,01,01);
....
&& EF.Functions.DateDiffYear(policy.PolicyEnd, dt) >= 0
or since you are checking only year you can try to use the whole data, sometimes it works
var dt = new DateTime(2021, 12, 31).AddDays(1).AddTicks(-1);
...
&& policy.PolicyEnd > dt

DocumentClient takes too long when queried over a DateTime field

I have the following code to get the list of some objects from a DocumentDB database:
var document = this._client.CreateDocumentQuery<T>(UriFactory.CreateCollectionUri(dbName, collectionName), queryOptions)
.Where(r => r.pDate >= startDate && r.pDate <= endDate);
var result = document.ToList();
pDate is of type DateTime, and stored in the database as string with ISO8601 format.
The query takes unreasonably too long, like 4 to 5 minutes, to return the results back. When I trace the program it is that .ToList() where the program gets stuck. Oddly, the query quickly returns for some specific start and end dates.
The query also quickly comes back with some results if I put the filter on some fields other than pDate.
My settings are consistent with explanations in this document but I still get a very poor performance almost all the time except for those few exceptions.
I have tried several methods mentioned here and there to resolve the issue, but no luck so far. I appreciate any comment or solution to the problem.
It could be because the indexing that is applied on this particular field.
From this link
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/cosmos-db/indexing-policies,
you would need an Range index for range or Order by Queries.
The default index policy that is applied to a collection is
"Hash for Strings and Range for Numbers"
Datetimes are stored as strings, so for running range comparison queries or order by queries you would need to set the indexing policy to "Range" for string datatypes with precision to -1.

How to compare dates (stored as strings) with linq to entities?

I am trying to pull data from a database by begin/end date parameters.
However the date that I need to filter on is stored as a string in Oracle DB.
Using linq how can I filter the dates out based on my parameters (which will be in a DateTime type)?
I originally tried:
var test = context.MY_TABLE
.Include(x => x.MY_DETAILS)
.Where(x => startDate >= MyHelpers.ConvertDate(x.DATE_FIELD) &&
endDate <= MyHelpers.ConvertDate(x.DATE_FIELD))
.ToList();
I understand the error because linq can't generate the necessary sql statements from my method.
So how can I compare the dates with linq that are stored in the DB as a string?
To boot I won't know how the date will be stored in the string. For the time being I will assume '3/10/2016 12:30:00' will be the date string.
How big is the list? On .NET side the easiest way would be parsing the string into DateTime method and compare the results. But it is not possible to do that on Database side because EF cannot translate methods like DateTime.Parse or your MyHelpers.ConvertDate.
If your list is not very large (you must decide what "large" exactly means) you can "download all into .NET" and handle the data there. This can be done by calling ToList or ToArray before the first custom method is called.
var test = context.MY_TABLE
.Include(x => x.MY_DETAILS)
.ToList() // or .ToArray()
.Where(x => startDate >= MyHelpers.ConvertDate(x.DATE_FIELD) &&
endDate <= MyHelpers.ConvertDate(x.DATE_FIELD))
.ToList();
But this solution can be slow if you have a large result set and if you don't need the complete data it is pretty wasteful.
Another way I see is, not accessing the DbSet<T> but using a stored procedure. This procedure can parse the strings, compare them and return only what you really need.
SPs can be easily accessed in EF like the table data but the select-code is on database side written in SQL.
As mentioned by RIanGillis you can use ExecuteSqlCommand instead of a stored procedure too. This method takes an SQL string as an argument, so you can use any conversion method that is available in your database. It works similar to a stored procedure but the SQL statement would be stored in the .NET code.

Compare date if there is a date in the database

I have a simple LINQ query. I would like to only check the DateDisable if there is an entry in the database. If the user doesn't select a date to disable the entry will always show. Can someone please show me how to add a conditional statement within linq
return (from promo in context.Promoes
where promo.DateEnable <= DateTime.Today
where promo.DateDisable >= DateTime.Today
orderby promo.SortOrder
select promo).ToList();
Given that DateEnable is a DateTime?, you can do the following:
// Get today.
DateTime today = DateTime.Today;
return (
from promo in context.Promoes
where
promo.DateEnable <= today &&
(promo.DateDisable == null || promo.DateDisable >= today)
orderby promo.SortOrder
select promo
).ToList();
Basically, you need to check for null or whether or not the date is greater than today.
Also you should capture the value outside of the statement, it's not guaranteed that the the LINQ provider will translate DateTime.Today on the database side correctly.
However, be warned that because of deferred execution, if you wait a long time to execute the query, today might not give you the value you expect (if the time between declaring the query and executing it rolls past midnight).
Of course, if your database server is in a different timezone than your application server, then you'll need to ensure that DateTime.Today is handled by your LINQ provider correctly (so that it's executed on the server) and use that if you want to compare against time on the DB server. If your provider doesn't handle translating DateTime.Today correctly, then you'll have to resort to a stored procedure and call that.

Linq to Entity get a Date from DateTime

var islemList = (from isl in entities.Islemler where (isl.KayitTarihi.Date >= dbas && isl.KayitTarihi.Value.Date <= dbit) select isl);
It gives error: date is not supported in LINQ to Entities...
How can i get date in linq.
Use EntityFunctions.TruncateTime.
if KayitTarihi is a date column in DB (and dbas and dbit are DateTime), use:
var islemList = (from isl in entities.Islemler where (isl.KayitTarihi >= dbas && isl.KayitTarihi <= dbit) select isl);
The .Date property is not supported in Linq to Entities (though it may be supported in other implementations of Linq).
I realize that you only want to compare the dates, but there is no real problem with comparing the datetimes if the dbas and dbit values are datetimes with time 00:00:00.
You might have to offset the dates or use other inequality checks to get the proper interval but the comparison will work as you intend.
I would personally go with Jandek's solution.

Categories