How to: Add an Entity to a Model

Article
04/28/2015

To create an entity, add an entity control from the Visual Studio Toolbox onto the Business Data Connectivity (BDC) designer.

To add an entity to the model

Create a BDC project, or open an existing BDC project. For more information, see Creating a Business Data Connectivity Model.
In the Toolbox, from the BusinessDataCatalog group, add an Entity control onto the designer.

The new entity appears on the designer. Visual Studio adds an <Entity> element to the XML of the BDC model file in your project. For more information about the attributes of an Entity element, see Entity.
On the designer, open the shortcut menu for the entity, choose Add, and then choose Identifier.

A new identifier appears on the entity.

Note

You can change the name of the entity and the identifier in the Properties window.

Define the fields of the entity in a class. You can either add a new class to the project or use an existing class created by using other tools such as the Object Relational Designer (O/R Designer). The following example shows an entity class named Contact.

Partial Public Class Contact

    Private _ContactID As Integer 
    Public Property ContactID() As Integer 
        Get 
            Return _ContactID
        End Get 
        Set(ByVal value As Integer)
            _ContactID = value
        End Set 
    End Property 
    Private _FirstName As String 
    Public Property FirstName() As String 
        Get 
            Return _FirstName
        End Get 
        Set(ByVal value As String)
            _FirstName = value
        End Set 
    End Property 
    Private _LastName As String 
    Public Property LastName() As String 
        Get 
            Return _LastName
        End Get 
        Set(ByVal value As String)
            _LastName = value
        End Set 
    End Property 
    Private _EmailAddress As String 
    Public Property EmailAddress() As String 
        Get 
            Return _EmailAddress
        End Get 
        Set(ByVal value As String)
            _EmailAddress = value
        End Set 
    End Property 
    Private _Phone As String 
    Public Property Phone() As String 
        Get 
            Return _Phone
        End Get 
        Set(ByVal value As String)
            _Phone = value
        End Set 
    End Property 
    Private _EmailPromotion As Integer 
    Public Property EmailPromotion() As Integer 
        Get 
            Return _EmailPromotion
        End Get 
        Set(ByVal value As Integer)
            _EmailPromotion = value
        End Set 
    End Property 
    Private _NameStyle As Boolean 
    Public Property NameStyle() As Boolean 
        Get 
            Return _NameStyle
        End Get 
        Set(ByVal value As Boolean)
            _NameStyle = value
        End Set 
    End Property 
    Private _PasswordHash As String 
    Public Property PasswordHash() As String 
        Get 
            Return _PasswordHash
        End Get 
        Set(ByVal value As String)
            _PasswordHash = value
        End Set 
    End Property 
    Private _PasswordSalt As String 
    Public Property PasswordSalt() As String 
        Get 
            Return _PasswordSalt
        End Get 
        Set(ByVal value As String)
            _PasswordSalt = value
        End Set 
    End Property 

End Class

public partial class Contact
    {
        public int ContactID { get; set; }
        public string FirstName { get; set; }
        public string LastName { get; set; }
        public string EmailAddress { get; set; }
        public string Phone { get; set; }
        public int EmailPromotion { get; set; }
        public bool NameStyle { get; set; }
        public string PasswordHash { get; set; }
        public string PasswordSalt { get; set; }

    }

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How to: Add an Entity to a Model

To add an entity to the model

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