Marten is a .NET document database library that uses an underlying PostgreSQL database to store objects as JSON.

In the  previous article (Enforcing Referential Integrity Between Documents with Marten and PostgreSQL) we saw how we can enable referential integrity between documents and the example showed a Customer document may have many related Order documents.

When creating LINQ queries with Marten, one feature is the idea of included documents. So for example we might want to get a Customer document and all the Order documents for that customer.

We could write some code as follows to get Customer 4001 and a list of their Orders:

// 2 trips to database, 2 queries
using (var session = store.QuerySession())
{
    Customer customer = session.Query<Customer>()
                               .Single(x => x.Id == 4001);

    Console.WriteLine(customer.Name);

    IEnumerable<Order> orders = session.Query<Order>()
                                       .Where(x => x.CustomerId == 4001);

    foreach (var order in orders)
    {
        Console.WriteLine($" Order {order.Id} for {order.Quantity} items");
    }
}

The preceding code however will result in two round trips to the database which may result in a performance problem:

select d.data, d.id, d.mt_version 
from public.mt_doc_customer as d 
where d.id = 4001 LIMIT 2

select d.data, d.id, d.mt_version
from public.mt_doc_order as d 
where d.customer_id = 4001

The .Include() extension method of Marten allows a single round trip to be made to the database that executes a SQL join and returns both the Customer data and Orders.

The following code shows how to accomplish this, notice that we need to declare an “output” variable to hold the “included” customer.

// 1 trip to database, 1 query
using (var session = store.QuerySession())
{                
    Customer customer = null;

    List<Order> orders = 
         session.Query<Order>()
                .Include<Customer>(joinOnOrder => joinOnOrder.CustomerId, includedCustomer => customer = includedCustomer)
                .Where(x => x.CustomerId == 4001)
                .ToList();


    Console.WriteLine(customer.Name);

    foreach (var order in orders)
    {
        Console.WriteLine($" Order {order.Id} for {order.Quantity} items");
    }  
}

The preceding code now only makes a single request to the database with the following SQL:

select d.data, d.id, d.mt_version, customer_id.data, customer_id.id, customer_id.mt_version 
from public.mt_doc_order as d 
INNER JOIN public.mt_doc_customer as customer_id ON d.customer_id = customer_id.id 
where d.customer_id = 4001

To learn more about the document database features of Marten check out my Pluralsight courses: Getting Started with .NET Document Databases Using Marten and Working with Data and Schemas in Marten.

You can start watching with a Pluralsight free trial.

SHARE:

Even though Marten is a library to enable document database storage semantics, because it’s built on top of (the advanced JSON features) of PostgreSQL, and PostgreSQL itself is relational, we can add constraints between document instances just as we would do in relational normalised databases.

For example, the following two simplified classes represent an order that points to a customer document:

class Customer
{
    public int Id { get; set; }
    public string Name { get; set; }
    
    // etc.
}

class Order
{
    public int Id { get; set; }
    public int CustomerId { get; set; }
    public int Quantity { get; set; }
    
    // etc.
}

By default there is no referential integrity enforcing the idea that the CustomerId in the Order class must point to an existing Customer document in the database. This means that the following code succeeds with no errors:

const string connectionString = "host = localhost; database = OrderDb; password = g7qo84nck22i; username = postgres";

var store = DocumentStore.For(connectionString);

using (var session = store.OpenSession())
{
    var order = new Order
    {
        Quantity=42,
        CustomerId = 34567 // non-existent
    };

    session.Store(order);

    session.SaveChanges(); // no error
}

The preceding code will result in an order document being stored with an invalid CustomerId.

Marten can be configured to enforce this by either adding the [ForeignKey(typeof(Customer))] attribute to the CustomerId property or by configuring the document store as the following code shows:

var store = DocumentStore.For(configure =>
{
    configure.Connection(connectionString);
    configure.Schema.For<Order>().ForeignKey<Customer>(x => x.CustomerId);
});

Now running the code again will result in an exception: insert or update on table "mt_doc_order" violates foreign key constraint "mt_doc_order_customer_id_fkey”.

If the code is modified to create a valid customer in the same session, Marten will generate a customer Id that can then be used in the order. When SaveChanges() is called, Marten will save the dependent customer document first and then the order document that points to it. The following code executes successfully:

using (var session = store.OpenSession())
{
    var customer = new Customer {Name = "Sarah"};

    session.Store(customer);
    
    // customer now has an Id auto-generated 

    var order = new Order
    {
        Quantity = 42,
        CustomerId = customer.Id // valid existing customer ID
    };

    session.Store(order);

    session.SaveChanges();
}

To learn more about the document database features of Marten check out my Pluralsight courses: Getting Started with .NET Document Databases Using Marten and Working with Data and Schemas in Marten.

You can start watching with a Pluralsight free trial.

SHARE:

Document databases are a form of NoSQL database that store items (objects) as single documents rather than potentially splitting the data among multiple relational database tables.

Marten is a .NET library that enables the storing, loading, deleting, and querying of documents. Objects in the application can be stored into the document database and retrieved back as an object from the database. In this approach there is no requirement for the additional “plumbing code” of ORMs.

Marten is not a database itself but rather a library that interacts with the (advanced JSON features) of the open source, cross platform PostgreSQL database.

Once the Marten NuGet package is installed there are a number of steps to storing .NET objects as documents.

First the “document” to be stored is defined. At the most basic level this is a class that has a field or property that represents the document identity as stored in the database. There are a number of ways to define  identity, one of which is to follow the naming convention “Id” as the following class shows:

class Customer
{
    public int Id { get; set; }
    public string Name { get; set; }
    public List<Address> Addresses { get; set; } = new List<Address>();
}

internal class Address
{
    public string Line1 { get; set; }
    public string Line2 { get; set; }
    public string Line3 { get; set; }
}

Notice in the preceding code that the Address class does not have an Id. This is because the address information will be storing in the overall Customer document, rather than for example in a relational database as rows in a separate Address table.

To work with the database a document store instance is required, this can be created with additional configuration or with the simple code shown below:

var connectionString = "host = localhost; database = CustomerDb; password = YOURPASSWORD; username = postgres";

var store = DocumentStore.For(connectionString);

Working with documents happens by way of a session instance, there are a number of types/configurations of sessions available.

To create a new customer object and store it the following code could be used:

// Store document (& auto-generate Id)
using (var session = store.LightweightSession())
{
    var customer =  new Customer
    {
        Name = "Arnold",
        Addresses =
        {
            new Address {Line1="Address 1 Line 1", Line2="Address 1 Line 2",Line3="Address 1 Line 3"},
            new Address {Line1="Address 2 Line 1", Line2="Address 2 Line 2",Line3="Address 2 Line 3"}
        }
    };

    // Add customer to session
    session.Store(customer);

    // Persist changes to the database
    session.SaveChanges();
}

Once the above code executes, the customer will be stored in a PostgreSQL table called “mt_doc_customer”. The Customer object will be serialized to JSON and stored in a special JSONB field in PostgreSQL. The JSON data also contains all the addresses.

{
  "Addresses": [
    {
      "Line3": "Address 1 Line 3",
      "Line2": "Address 1 Line 2",
      "Line1": "Address 1 Line 1"
    },
    {
      "Line3": "Address 2 Line 3",
      "Line2": "Address 2 Line 2",
      "Line1": "Address 2 Line 1"
    }
  ],
  "Id": 1,
  "Name": "Arnold"
}

There are a number of ways to retrieve documents and convert them back into .NET objects. One method is to use the Marten LINQ support as the following code shows:

// Retrieve by query
using (var session = store.QuerySession())
{
    var customer = session.Query<Customer>().Single(x => x.Name == "Arnold");
                
    Console.WriteLine(customer.Id);
    Console.WriteLine(customer.Name);
}

When executed, this code displays the retrieved customer details as the following screenshot shows:

To learn more about the document database features of Marten check out my Pluralsight courses: Getting Started with .NET Document Databases Using Marten and Working with Data and Schemas in Marten.

You can start watching with a Pluralsight free trial.

SHARE:

Just as I created the free C# 6.0: What’s New Quick Start eBook, I will be writing a new book for the new C# 7.0 features.

If you would like to be notified when the book is available you can register your interest.

If you want to fill in the gaps in your C# knowledge be sure to check out my C# Tips and Traps training course from Pluralsight – get started with a free trial.

SHARE:

Azure Functions allow the creation of Serverless event driven applications with minimal effort. We can create Azure Functions using C# (or other languages) right inside the Azure Web app.

Functions sit inside a function app and each function can be configured to be executed in response to a number of triggers such as a BlobTrigger, EventHubTrigger, etc. One of the triggers is the Timer trigger that can be configured to execute the function on a specified schedule.

To get get started, once you’ve created an Azure account and logged in, head to http://functions.azure.com/ and this will allow a quickstart experience to develop your function (you may be asked to create a new Function App as a container for your functions so go ahead and follow the prompts to do this).

Click “Create this function” and you’ll be taken to the editor.

In the code section (within the Run method) we can write code that is executed when the function executes.

Clicking on the Integrate tab allows the specification of the schedule in CRON format.

To have the function execute every five minutes we would specify: 0 */5 * * * *

A function can have Outputs, one of which is a Twilio output. At the time of writing this is in an early beta/experimental phase and I couldn’t get it to work correctly. However because we can write C#, we can send an SMS by using the Twilio REST API. You need to sign up for a Twilio trial account and this will give you a Twilio AccountSID and an authorisation token.

Click the Develop tab and add the following code (using your Twilio SID and auth token):

using System;
using Twilio;

public static void Run(TimerInfo myTimer, TraceWriter log)
{
    log.Info($"C# Timer trigger function executed at: {DateTime.Now}");    

    string accountSid = "YOUR SID HERE";
    string authToken = "YOUR TOKEN HERE";

    var client = new TwilioRestClient(accountSid, authToken);

        client.SendMessage(
            "+614xxxxxxxx", // Insert your Twilio from SMS number here
            "+614xxxxxxxx", // Insert your verified (trial) to SMS number here
            "hello from Azure Functions!" + DateTime.Now            
        );
}

(+614 is the dialling code for Australian mobiles so you should replace this with whatever makes sense for the Twilio account phone numbers you’ve created.)

Click Save and you’ll get some compilation errors because we haven’t yet added the Twilio NuGet package to be used by our code.

Click the View Files link under the code editing window and add a new file (by clicking the plus icon). Add a file called project.json with the following content:

Click Save and in the logs section you should see the package installed:

Now every five minutes you’ll get a text message sent!

Just remember to disable/delete the function or you will continue to get messages sent. You can do this by clicking on the Manage tab and choosing the appropriate option:

SHARE:

My latest Pluralsight course is now available for viewing. It demonstrates how to use the Scientist.NET library to execute candidate code in production alongside the existing production code. This allows the new candidate code to be additionally verified as able to work in production (for example with production data that may be of variable quality) and offers an additional check in addition to automated tests that have been executed in the development/QA environment.

From the course description: “Errors in production code can be costly to fix, more stressful for the development team, and frustrating for the end-user. In this course, Testing C# Code in Production with Scientist.NET, you will get to see how Scientist.NET allows sections of the application to be changed more safely by running both the existing code alongside the new code in production. You'll begin with an introduction to Scientist.NET before installing it and writing your first experiment. Next, you'll learn how to customize the configuration of experiments. Finally, you'll learn how to publish experiment data to SQL Server and analyze experiment results…”

You can check out the new course here.

You can start watching with a Pluralsight free trial.

SHARE:

When refactoring a part of an application we can use the existing tests to give a level of confidence that the refactored code still produces the same result, i.e. the existing tests still pass with the new implementations.

A system that has been in production use for some time is likely to have amassed a lot of data that is flowing through the “legacy” code. This means that although the existing tests may still pass, when used in production the new refactored code may produce errors or unexpected results.

It would be helpful as an experiment to run the existing legacy code alongside the new code to see if the results differ, but still continue to use the result of the existing legacy code. Scientist.NET allows exactly this kind of experimentation to take place.

Scientist.NET is a port of the Scientist library for Ruby. It is currently in pre-release and has a NuGet package we can use.

An Example Experiment

Suppose there is an interface as shown in the following code that describes the ability to sum a list if integer values and return the result.

interface ISequenceSummer
{
    int Sum(int numberOfTerms);
}

This interface is currently implemented in the legacy code as follows:

class SequenceSummer : ISequenceSummer
{
    public int Sum(int numberOfTerms)
    {
        var terms = new int[numberOfTerms];


        // generate sequence of terms
        var currentTerm = 0;
        for (int i = 0; i < terms.Length; i++)
        {
            terms[i] = currentTerm;
            currentTerm++;
        }


        // Sum
        int sum = 0;
        for (int i = 0; i < terms.Length; i++)
        {
            sum += terms[i];
        }

        return sum;
    }
}

As part of the refactoring of the legacy code, this implementation is to be replaced with a version that utilizes LINQ as shown in the following code:

class SequenceSummerLinq : ISequenceSummer
{
    public int Sum(int numberOfTerms)
    {
        // generate sequence of terms
        var terms = Enumerable.Range(0, 5).ToArray();
            
        // sum
        return terms.Sum();
    }
}

After installing the Scientist.NET NuGet package, an experiment can be created using the following code:

int result;            

result = Scientist.Science<int>("sequence sum", experiment =>
{
    experiment.Use(() => new SequenceSummer().Sum(5)); // current production method

    experiment.Try("Candidate using LINQ", () => new SequenceSummerLinq().Sum(5)); // new proposed production method

}); // return the control value (result from SequenceSummer)

This code will run the .Use(…) code that contains the existing legacy implementation. It will also run the .Try(…) code that contains the new implementation. Scientist.NET will store both results for reporting on and then return the result from the .Use(…) code for use by the rest of the program. This allows any differences to be reported on but without actually changing the implementation of the production code. At some point in the future, if the results of the legacy code (the control) match that of the new code (the candidate), the refactoring can be completed by removing the old implementation (and the experiment code) and simply calling the new implementation.

To get the results of the experiment, a reporter can be written and configured. The following code shows a custom reporter that simply reports to the Console:

public class ConsoleResultPublisher : IResultPublisher
{
    public Task Publish<T>(Result<T> result)
    {
        Console.ForegroundColor = result.Mismatched ? ConsoleColor.Red : ConsoleColor.Green;

        Console.WriteLine($"Experiment name '{result.ExperimentName}'");
        Console.WriteLine($"Result: {(result.Matched ? "Control value MATCHED candidate value" : "Control value DID NOT MATCH candidate value")}");
        Console.WriteLine($"Control value: {result.Control.Value}");
        Console.WriteLine($"Control execution duration: {result.Control.Duration}");
        foreach (var observation in result.Candidates)
        {
            Console.WriteLine($"Candidate name: {observation.Name}");
            Console.WriteLine($"Candidate value: {observation.Value}");
            Console.WriteLine($"Candidate execution duration: {observation.Duration}");
        }

        if (result.Mismatched)
        {
            // saved mismatched experiments to event log, file, database, etc for alerting/comparison
        }

        Console.ForegroundColor = ConsoleColor.White;

        return Task.FromResult(0);
    }  
}

To plug this in, before the experiment code is executed:

Scientist.ResultPublisher = new ConsoleResultPublisher();

The output of the experiment (and the custom reporter) look like the following screenshot:

To learn more about Scientist.NET check out my Pluralsight course: Testing C# Code in Production with Scientist.NET.

You can start watching with a Pluralsight free trial.

SHARE:

My latest Pluralsight course is now available for viewing. It covers the fundamental aspects of working with nulls in C# code.

From the course description: “Unexpected null values and NullReferenceExceptions can be a constant source of bugs resulting in wasted time and out of hours support callouts. In this course, Working with Nulls in C#, you're going to learn about the different ways that null values pop up in C# code and how to deal with them. First, you're going to learn the fundamentals of why you get null values and the difference between value and reference types. Next you'll learn how you can use the various C# operators to check for and manipulate nulls. Finally, you'll learn how to think about nulls at a higher abstraction level in your object-oriented code. By the end of this course, you'll understand the different types of objects in C#, how to correctly create nullable value types, how to use C# operators to work with nulls with fewer lines of code, and how to implement the Null Object pattern to remove the need to write repetitive null checking code.”

You can check out the course here.

You can start watching with a Pluralsight free trial.

SHARE:

Utilizing the dynamic features of C# and the Dynamic Language Runtime (DLR), among other things, allows C# programs to interoperate with other dynamic languages built on top of the DLR.

For example, Python has the ability to chain operators, for example the expression “10 < 15 < 20” returns true: 10 is less than 15 and 15 is less than 20.

To use a chained Python expression from C# code, IronPython can be used.

To get started (in this example a C# console application) first install the IronPython NuGet package. This allows the application to interoperate with Python code.

The following code shows a console application that evaluates a user-entered number “n” against the Python expression “10 < n < 20”:

using IronPython.Hosting;
using Microsoft.Scripting;
using Microsoft.Scripting.Hosting;
using static System.Console;

namespace PythonCSharp
{
    class Program
    {
        static void Main(string[] args)
        {
            const string pythonExpression = "10 < n < 20";

            int n;

            while (true)
            {
                WriteLine($"Enter a value for n where {pythonExpression}");

                n = int.Parse(ReadLine()); // cast error check omitted

                ScriptEngine pythonEngine = Python.CreateEngine();

                ScriptScope pythonScope = pythonEngine.CreateScope();

                // set the value of the Python token "n" in the expression 10 < n < 20
                pythonScope.SetVariable("n", n);

                ScriptSource pythonScriptSource = pythonEngine.CreateScriptSourceFromString(pythonExpression, SourceCodeKind.Expression);

                // Execute the Python expression and get the return value
                dynamic dynamicResult = pythonScriptSource.Execute(pythonScope);

                WriteLine($"{pythonScriptSource.GetCode().Replace("n", n.ToString())} = {dynamicResult}");

                WriteLine();
            }
        }
    }
}

Running the console application allows the user to enter a value for “n” and evaluate it against the Python expression as the following image shows:

To learn more about how C# makes dynamic possible, some potential use cases, and more detailed on implementing custom types check out my Dynamic C# Fundamentals Pluralsight course.

You can start watching with a Pluralsight free trial.

SHARE:

By default, actors in Akka.NET lose their internal state when they are restarted, for example due to an internal actor error or a system crash.

Akka.Persistence adds additional functionality to enable the storing and restoring of actor state.

There are 2 main persistence concepts: journal storage and snapshot storage.

The Journal

As messages are received by an actor, they may cause some change in the internal actor state. Using Akka Persistence, these messages can be saved in one of a number of configurable journal stores such as SQL Server. When the actor restarts, the messages from the configured journal store are retrieved and “replayed” by the actor. The messages from the journal store will be replayed in the same order as they were originally received by the actor. This in effect rebuilds the actor state one message at a time, each replayed message changing actor state. Once all messages from the journal store have been replayed, the actor state will be equal to what it was before it restarted; it can now process new messages sent to it.

Snapshots

Snapshots are an optional addition on top of the journal store. If an actor has too many messages being replayed from the journal store, and this is causing a performance problem, snapshots can be implemented.

A snapshot, as its name suggests, is a picture of the actor’s state at a given point in time. Snapshots can be created in actor code whenever it is deemed appropriate, for example after every 50 messages have been processed.

Snapshots can improve actor recovery speeds because only those messages stored in the journal since the last snapshot was created need to be replayed. For example, an actor has received 60 messages and a snapshot was created on the 50th message. On restart, Akka.NET notices that a snapshot was created after the 50th message; this snapshot will be loaded into the actor’s state. Now only 10 messages need to be individually replayed (messages 51-60), rather than all 60 messages individually.

To learn more about Akka.Persistence, check out my Akka.NET Persistence Fundamentals Pluralsight course or the Akka.NET documentation.

You can start watching with a Pluralsight free trial.

SHARE: