Dapper can't ignore nested objects for parameter? - dapper

Question

I am beginning to use Dapper and love it so far. However as i venture further into complexity, i have ran into a big issue with it. The fact that you can pass an entire custom object as a parameter is great. However, when i add another custom object a a property, it no longer works as it tries to map the object as a SQL parameter. Is there any way to have it ignore custom objects that are properties of the main object being passed thru? Example below
public class CarMaker
{
public string Name { get; set; }
public Car Mycar { get; set; }
}
propery Name maps fine but property MyCar fails because it is a custom object. I will have to restructure my entire project if Dapper can't handle this which...well blows haha

Answer 1

Dapper extensions has a way to create custom maps, which allows you to ignore properties:
public class MyModelMapper : ClassMapper<MyModel>
{
public MyModelMapper()
{
//use a custom schema
Schema("not_dbo_schema");
//have a custom primary key
Map(x => x.ThePrimaryKey).Key(KeyType.Assigned);
//Use a different name property from database column
Map(x=> x.Foo).Column("Bar");
//Ignore this property entirely
Map(x=> x.SecretDataMan).Ignore();
//optional, map all other columns
AutoMap();
}
}
Here is a link

Answer 2

There is a much simpler solution to this problem.
If the property MyCar is not in the database, and it is probably not, then simple remove the {get;set;} and the "property" becomes a field and is automatically ignored by DapperExtensions. If you are actually storing this information in a database and it is a multi-valued property that is not serialized into a JSON or similar format, I think you are probably asking for complexity that you don't want. There is no sql equivalent of the object "Car", and the properties in your model must map to something that sql recognizes.
UPDATE:
If "Car" is part of a table in your database, then you can read it into the CarMaker object using Dapper's QueryMultiple.
I use it in this fashion:
dynamic reader = dbConnection.QueryMultiple("Request_s", param: new { id = id }, commandType: CommandType.StoredProcedure);
if (reader != null)
{
result = reader.Read<Models.Request>()[0] as Models.Request;
result.reviews = reader.Read<Models.Review>() as IEnumerable<Models.Review>;
}
The Request Class has a field as such:
public IEnumerable<Models.Review> reviews;
The stored procedure looks like this:
ALTER PROCEDURE [dbo].[Request_s]
(
#id int = null
)
AS
BEGIN
SELECT *
FROM [biospecimen].requests as bn
where bn.id=coalesce(#id, bn.id)
order by bn.id desc;
if #id is not null
begin
SELECT
*
FROM [biospecimen].reviews as bn
where bn.request_id = #id;
end
END
In the first read, Dapper ignores the field reviews, and in the second read, Dapper loads the information into the field. If a null set is returned, Dapper will load the field with a null set just like it will load the parent class with null contents.
The second select statement then reads the collection needed to complete the object, and Dapper stores the output as shown.
I have been implementing this in my Repository classes in situations where a target parent class has several child classes that are being displayed at the same time.
This prevents multiple trips to the database.
You can also use this approach when the target class is a child class and you need information about the parent class it is related to.