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In order to use Entity Framework in your local development environment, you need to have a database server. Let's confirm if you have SQL Server LocalDB installed and configured correctly, and if not, how to install and configure it.
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Even though Entity Framework supports
variety of databases, the vast majority of
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the time you'll be targeting
Microsoft's own SQL Server database.
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SQL Server is a robust enterprise-grade
database server that can be
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installed on your own local machines or
ran in the cloud on virtual machines.
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SQL Server is even available as a service
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on Microsoft's Azure
cloud computing platform.
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When developing applications with EF,
we can target a developer-centric
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version of SQL Server,
appropriately named LocalDB.
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LocalDB is easier to install and configure
than the full SQL Server product.
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Developing database-backed applications
is so commonplace that when you install
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Visual Studio Community,
LocalDB will be installed by default.
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So if you have
Visual Studio Community installed,
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you should have LocalDB installed.
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But development environments and
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their configuration can sometimes
vary in unexpected ways.
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In this video,
we'll verify that LocalDB is installed and
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configured to work correctly with EF.
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Let's start with checking
if LocalDB is installed.
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Open a command prompt window and
run the command sqllocaldb.
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If LocalDB is installed,
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you'll see information about the SQL
Server Express LocalDB command line tool,
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including the version number and a list
of the operations that you can perform.
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This tells us that this
environment has LocalDB installed.
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LocalDB has a notion of named instances.
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We'll see an example of how
they're used in the next video.
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To see a list of the instances
that are available,
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we can add the info operation just
after the sqllocaldb command.
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sqllocaldb, space, info.
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This environment has
two LocalDB instances,
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MSSQLLocalDB and ProjectsV13.
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MSSQLLocalDB is the default instance
name used by SQL Server 2014 and
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2016, versions 12 and 13 respectively.
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SQL Server 2012 or version 11 used
a default instance named V11.0.
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EF will look for and connect to
a LocalDB instance named MSSQLLocalDB.
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So this environment is properly
configured to support EF development.
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The project's V13 instance
is created specifically for
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SQL Server data tools, and shouldn't
be used for application development.
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SQL Server Data Tools or
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SSDT is a set of database
development tools for Visual Studio.
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SSDT is beyond the scope of this course.
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See the teacher's notes for
more information.
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Let's switch to an installation of Windows
10 that doesn't have Visual Studio or
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LocalDB installed.
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I'll open a Command Prompt window and
run the sqllocaldb command.
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And we get an error message,
sqllocaldb is not recognized
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as an internal or external command,
operable program or batch file.
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This error message is a likely
indication that LocalDB isn't installed.
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If we open the Windows 10 App
& features window, we can
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scroll through the list of installed apps
and see that LocalDB isn't in the list.
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To install LocalDB, we need to first
download the SQL Server Express installer.
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Open a browser and search for
SQL Server Express download.
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Here's the link to download the installer.
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Select your preferred language and
click Download.
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Click Yes to allow this app to
make changes to your device.
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When prompted to select an installation
type, click on the Download Media option.
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Then we can select to download
the LocalDB installer.
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When the download has completed, click
Open folder to browse through the folder
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that the installer was downloaded to.
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Double-click the SqlLocalDB file to
start the installation wizard and
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follow the prompts.
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Once the installation process is
completed, close all of the open windows.
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Open a Command Prompt window and
run the sqllocaldb command.
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Looks good so far.
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Now run the sqllocaldb info command.
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We have a single instance
named MSSQLLocalDB.
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So now we're all set to use EF.
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If you need to create an instance,
you can run the sqllocaldb
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command along with the create operation
and the name of the instance.
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Running the sqllocaldb info command again
shows that we now have two instances.
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We can delete the test instance
using the delete operation
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followed by the name of
the instance to delete.
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Running the sqllocaldb info command again
shows that the test instance is now gone.
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