Creating reports and dashboards | Stimulsoft community forum

Hi there,

I have a .net core web project which uses entity framework to access data from a sql server database. I would like to know how I can pass the data from an entity framework db call to a stimulsoft report, before I view the report .
I searched through the git hub examples but I could not find anything similar and I'm stuck.

If you could explain in some simple steps how I can pass a simple result (one db table) from entity framework core and pass this to a report for preview, I'm pretty sure I could work out the rest.

Any help will be greatly appreciated as I have been going in circles.

Hello,

You can retrieve data to the DataSet and then provide it to the report with the RegData() method.

Thank you.

Thanks Lech,

I have managed to retrieve the data from entity framework and convert it to a DataSet.
Is it possible to replace a Sql Server DataSource and TableName with a DataSet? I have tried this but I could not get it working with the DataSet.

var report = new StiReport();
DataSet ds;
IEnumerable<Variety> varieties;

report.Load(StiNetCoreHelper.MapPath(this, "Reports/VarietiesReport.mrt"));
report.Dictionary.Databases.Clear(); // I was hoping this would be the magic line of code needed

varieties = _context.Varieties.OrderBy(x => x.VarietyName); // Use Entity Framework to collect and sort the data
ds = varieties.ToDataSet("IGrowApp", "LkpVarietyTbl"); // this creates a DataSource and DataTable with matching names used in the report. The Entity Framework result is converted to a DataSet with an Extensions class I developed.
report.RegData(ds);
return StiNetCoreViewer.GetReportResult(this, report);

I can confirm that the DataSet works correctly because I tried it on another report where I copied my Variety class to a separate ClassLibrary project and then used this as a Business Objects (via the Data from Business Objects Wizard) using the same code above, just a different report name. The report displayed correctly with the required result from the DataSet.
Any further help is much appreciated.

Thank you.

Okay, so after some further digging the code below now works. I had to call DataSources.Clear() as well, then call report.Dictionary.Synchronize() after registering the DataSet. I hope this is the correct way to do this?
This now allows me to quickly design a report on my dev machine pointing directly at the sql server database so I can see the data when previewed, then I can quickly drop the report into the web project and provide the data from my controller via entity framework.

Someone reading this may ask, why did I not just choose a direct sql server connection?
I chose an Entity Framework context over a direct sql connection, because its a mult-tenant web app where one user may access a completely separate tenant database. The EF DataContext automatically handles the connection to the db based on the authenticated user, so I don't have to worry about it, all I have to do is use the EF context to fill a DbSet etc, it auto handles what db it should come from. Having the ability to point the report directly at a development sql database and then deploy it to test>production with a small amount of code required to hook it up to EF will save me a lot of time.

var report = new StiReport();
DataSet ds;
IEnumerable<Variety> varieties;

report.Load(StiNetCoreHelper.MapPath(this, "Reports/VarietiesReport.mrt"));
report.Dictionary.Databases.Clear();
report.Dictionary.DataSources.Clear();

varieties = _context.Varieties.OrderBy(x => x.VarietyName);
ds = varieties.ToDataSet("IGrowApp", "LkpVarietyTbl");
report.RegData(ds);
report.Dictionary.Synchronize();
return StiNetCoreViewer.GetReportResult(this, report);

I think it would be a good idea if the guys at Stimulsoft built an example using Entity Framework to collect data for a Stimulsoft Master/Detail Report. Apologies if you have already done this. This may save some users many hours of work/grief down the track as EF has been around for ages and I could not find an example on your GitHub or any decent examples online, which I think would be a lot more relevant for businesses than accessing data from XML flat files etc.

I did see others with the same issue and converting an Entity Framework result to a DataSet is not an easy task, especially if the Model classes and Database support Nullable data types, which a strongly .Net DataSet does not support unless you look into adding DataTable columns with the property AllowDBNull = true for Nullable data types.

Cheers and have a good day.

Hello,

As a way, you can try to use business objects:

StiReport report = new StiReport();
varieties = _context.Varieties.OrderBy(x => x.VarietyName);
report.RegBusinessObject("varieties ", varieties);
report.Dictionary.SynchronizeBusinessObjects();

Thank you.