Introduction


This is an introductory book about Language Integrated Query (LINQ). The goal is to give you a comprehensive overview of this new and powerful technology by using clear and real examples that help you to discover the capabilities of LINQ.

To start playing with LINQ, you need the new version of Microsoft Visual Studio code named “Orcas.” You will find links to the latest bits on the MSDN Web site (http://msdn.microsoft.com).

The information covered in this book is based on beta versions of LINQ. Some features might be changed, removed, or added between now and the final release of the product. Such actions could invalidate some of the examples shown in this book. Nevertheless, we tried to focus on concepts and content not tied to specific syntax rules or build versions to make this book useful during the full product development life cycle. We are providing a Web site (http://www.introducinglinq.com/) where we will maintain a change list, a revision history, any corrections, and a blog about what is going on with the LINQ Project and this book.

About This Book

This book is divided into six chapters and one complementary appendix. Chapter 1, “LINQ Introduction,” is a brief overview of the product features and highlights, written to give you a preview of the technology from a 10,000-foot perspective. If you are not a developer or if you are not yet deeply interested in LINQ details, read this chapter to learn what LINQ is and what you can do with it, temporarily ignoring detailed “how to” instructions and best practices. If you want to go deeper into LINQ architecture, syntax, and implementations, read Chapter 4, “LINQ Syntax Fundamentals.” Chapter 5, “LINQ to ADO.NET,” is the chapter you should read if you are interested in querying relational data. And read Chapter 6, “LINQ to XML,” if you need to deal with angle brackets.

All of these chapters are mainly based on the C# 3.0 language, but whenever we considered it useful, we also included Microsoft Visual Basic 9.0 examples. To help you understand new features and syntax innovations of the next version of the Microsoft .NET Framework, we also covered the next versions of the C# and Visual Basic languages. If you are partial to C#, please refer to Chapter 2, “C# Language Features.” If you are a Visual Basic developer, Chapter 3, “Visual Basic 9.0 Language Features,” is for you, but we suggest that you also read Chapter 2. Many of the code samples in this book leverage new C# 3.0 features, and a comprehensive knowledge of that syntax is necessary to better understand LINQ. Likewise, a C# developer can take advantage of Chapter 3 to figure out when to use which language.

The appendix focuses on ADO.NET Entity Framework and provides details of the architecture and main features of the next version of ADO.NET. It gives you key information about the new entity modeling framework, which is also available and useful in LINQ through LINQ to Entities.

All sample code shown in this book is available for downloading from the book Web site (http://www.introducinglinq.com/). Every numbered listing has a corresponding excerpt in code samples; inline code is shown in text only as a reference and might not be present in source code files. Many examples involving relational databases are based on the well-known Northwind sample database to provide a common environment for everyone.




Introducing Microsoft LINQ
Introducing MicrosoftВ® LINQ
ISBN: 0735623910
EAN: 2147483647
Year: 2007
Pages: 78

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