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The team has been working primarily on EF Core internals, so there are no new big features in EF Core 9 (EF9) Preview 3. However, this means we really need people like you to run your code on these new internals and report back what you find. We want to fix bugs in the new internals as soon as possible in order to have a strong GA release later in the year.

That being said, there are several smaller enhancements included in preview 3. For full details, see What's new in EF Core 9. To discuss the EF9 release, go to Try EF Core 9 now! on GitHub.

Auto-compiled models

Auto-compiled models allow the EF Core compiled model to be automatically regenerated when the model project is built. This means you no longer need to remember to re-run the dotnet ef dbcontext optimize command after your EF model changes. See Auto-compiled models in the What's New docs for more information.

Sugar for HierarchyId path generation

First class support for the SQL Server HierarchyId type was added in EF8. In EF9, a sugar method has been added to make it easier to create new child nodes in the tree structure. See Sugar for HierarchyId path generation in the What's New docs for more information.

Everything else in preview 3

Preview 3 contains:

• 6 enhancements
• 5 bug fixes

EF Core 9 preview 3 (and Microsoft.Data.Sqlite) contains work from the EF Team at Microsoft (@roji @AndriySvyryd @maumar @ajcvickers @cincuranet @SamMonoRT @luisquintanilla) as well as contributions from the EF Core community. The community PRs in EF9 Preview 3 are:

• @lauxjpn: Cleanup duplicate tests (same test ID)
• @clement911: Fixed typo in getting-and-building-the-code.md
• @Rezakazemi890: 32943-Sugar for HierarchyId path generation
• @lauxjpn: Change Where_math(f)_log_new_base queries, so they fail if LOG() parameters are swapped
• @SteSinger: 33196 command timeout allow zero

EF Core 8.0.4 is available on NuGet now. This is a patch release of EF Core 8 (EF8) containing only important bug fixes:

• Incorrect apply projection for complex properties
• The database default created by Migrations for primitive collections mapped to JSON is invalid
• Filtering by Contains with HierarchyId and AsSplitQuery is not working
• Unfulfillable nullable contraints are set for complex types with TPH entities
• OutOfMemoryException when creating migration using ef tool
• SQL Server: Should retry on 203

This is a patch release of EF Core 7.0 containing only updates to dependencies. There are no additional fixes in this release beyond those already shipped in EF Core 7.0.17.

This is a patch release of EF Core 6.0 containing only updates to dependencies. There are no additional fixes in this release beyond those already shipped in EF Core 6.1.28.

The team has been working primarily on EF Core internals, so there are no new big features in EF Core 9 (EF9) Preview 2. However, this means we really need people like you to run your code on these new internals and report back what you find. We want to fix bugs in the new internals as soon as possible in order to have a strong GA release later in the year.

That being said, there are several smaller enhancements included in preview 2, many contributed by our community. For full details, see What's new in EF Core 9. To discuss the EF9 release, go to Try EF Core 9 now! on GitHub.

Improved queries

• Inlined uncorrelated subqueries
  • In EF8, an IQueryable referenced in another query may be executed as a separate database roundtrip.
  • See Inlined uncorrelated subqueries for full details.
• New ToHashSetAsync methods
  • The ToHashSet methods have existed since .NET Core 2.0. In EF9, the equivalent async methods have been added.
  • See New ToHashSetAsync<T> methods for full details.

Improved model building

• Specify caching for sequences
  • EF9 allows setting the caching options for database sequences for any relational database provider that supports this.
  • See Specify caching for sequences for full details.
• Specify fill-factor for keys and indexes
  • EF9 supports specification of the SQL Server fill-factor when using EF Core Migrations to create keys and indexes.
  • See Specify fill-factor for keys and indexes for full details.

Improved tooling

• Fewer rebuilds when using dotnet ef tools
  • EF9 invalidates build caches less often, resulting in faster re-builds.
  • See Fewer rebuilds for full details.

Everything else in preview 2

Preview 2 contains:

• 8 enhancements
• 10 bug fixes

EF Core 9 preview 2 (and Microsoft.Data.Sqlite) contains work from the EF Team at Microsoft (@roji @AndriySvyryd @maumar @ajcvickers) as well as contributions from the EF Core community. The community PRs in EF9 Preview 1 are:

• @Poppyto: stackalloc for BytesToDecimal
• @francopettinari: Microsoft.Data.Sqlite.Core issue with multiple Blob colums
• @wertzui: Added ToHashSetAsync<T> Extension methods on IQueryable<T>
• @Suchiman: Fix incremental builds
• @btecu: Cleanup asserts
• @EngincanV: Fix typos on DeleteBehavior.cs
• @petterh: Fix typos, doubled words
• @deano-hunter: Add fill factor to keys and unique constraints

EF Core 8.0.3 is available on NuGet now. This is a patch release of EF Core 8 (EF8) containing only important bug fixes:

• Constructor calls when using inheritance with owned entities causes exceptions
• Missing package README file
• String properties with indexes are compared case insensitively on SQL Server
• Using SqliteConnection from an ASP.NET MVC (.NET Framework) application results in a few different exceptions
• Exception when using FromSql on entity with ComplexProperty
• IndexOutOfRange for EntityEntry.GetDatabaseValues() with complex type and TPH
• SQL Server Migrations - SqlOperation.Sql is stripped of all empty lines
• NullReferenceException in Get-Migration in EF Core 8
• Owned entity on genericly typed entity generates unwanted steps in new migrations
• Dotnet-ef mismatch causes apply Entity Framework migration fails when publishing an individual web app.
• Query never returns when DB value for column mapped to primitive collection is

EF Core 7.0.17 is available on NuGet now. This is a patch release of EF Core 7 containing only important bug fixes:

• SqlClient - Update 8.0 to 5.1.5

This is a patch release of EF Core 6.0 containing only updates to dependencies. There are no additional fixes in this release beyond those already shipped in EF Core 6.1.27.

The team has been working primarily on EF Core internals, so there are no new big features in EF Core 9 (EF9) Preview 1. However, this means we really need people like you to run your code on these new internals and report back what you find. We want to fix bugs in the new internals as soon as possible in order to have a strong GA release later in the year.

That being said, there are also several smaller enhancements included in preview 1. One of these might be just the thing you have been waiting for, so read on!

• Discussion
• What's new in EF Core 9 documentation.
• Documentation & Samples

Improved queries

• Prune columns passed to OPENJSON's WITH clause
  • EF9 removes unnecessary columns when calling OPENJSON WITH.
  • See Prune columns from JSON in the What's New docs for full details including runnable samples.
• Translations involving GREATEST/LEAST
  • Several new translations have been introduced that use the GREATEST and LEAST SQL functions.
  • This includes translations of Math.Min and Math.Max in non-aggregate queries, as well as directly exposing the GREATEST and LEAST SQL functions in relational providers.
  • See GREATEST/LEAST translations in the What's New docs for full details including runnable samples.
• Force or prevent query parameterization
  • Except in some special cases, EF Core parameterizes variables used in a LINQ query, but includes constants in the generated SQL. EF9 allows constants to be translated to parameters and variables to be translated to constants on a case to case basis.
  • See Force or prevent query parameterization in the What's New docs for full details including runnable samples.

ExecuteUpdate

• Allow passing complex type instances to ExecuteUpdate
  • EF9 supports directly passing complex type instances to ExecuteUpdate as sugar for updating all member values.
  • See ExecuteUpdate for complex types in the What's New docs for full details including runnable samples.

Temporal tables

• Small migrations for temporal tables
  • The migration created when changing an existing table into a temporal table has been reduced in size for EF9.
  • See Improved temporal table migrations in the What's New docs for full details including runnable samples.

Model building

• Make existing model building conventions more extensible
  • In EF9, we have made it easier to extend some of the existing conventions, such as those for property and key discovery.
  • See Extensible model building conventions in the What's New docs for full details including runnable samples.
• ApplyConfigurationsFromAssembly calls non-public constructors
  • In EF9, we have both improved the error messages generated when this fails, and also enabled instantiation by non-public constructor.
  • See ApplyConfigurationsFromAssembly calls non-public constructors in the What's New docs for full details including runnable samples.

Everything else in Preview 1

Preview 1 contains:

• 30 enhancements
• 51 bug fixes in EF9 Preview 1
  • 8 bug fixes also shipped in 8.0.1
  • 25 bug fixes also shipped in 8.0.2
• 5 cleanup issues

EF Core 9 Preview 1 contains work from the EF Team at Microsoft (@roji @AndriySvyryd @maumar @ajcvickers) as well as contributions from the EF Core community. The community PRs in EF9 Preview 1 are:

• @davidnajar:
  • Allow specifying Assembly for migrations #32473
• @ErikEJ:
  • Update target framework to reflect reality #32602
• @Tim-Maes:
  • Update screenshot used in DailyBuilds.md #32604
• @dsgordeev:
  • Fix to https://github.com/dotnet/efcore/issues/31448 Use token for NonQueryResultAsync #31449

EF Core 8.0.2 is available on NuGet now. This is a patch release of EF Core 8 (EF8) containing only important bug fixes:

• Adding EF.Constant to prevent parameterization in query
• Nav expansion visitor does not visit the Contains item argument
• SqliteException "no such column : rX.value" when ordering on subquery value in combination with a "where contains" when upgrading from 7 to 8.0.0-rc.2.23480.1
• DB Context pooling with proxies resulting in memory issues in 8.0 RC2
• Nav expansion visitor does not visit the non-lambda arguments (Skip, Take, ElementAt)
• LINQ "Contains" generates SQL with wrong char length
• Using new[] in select query gives exception .NET 8
• EF Core Cosmos 7.0.13 => 7.0.14 Value cannot be null. (Parameter 'derivedType')
• New OpenJSON expression to SQL translation breaks aggregates on subquery with 'Cannot perform an aggregate function on an expression containing an aggregate or a subquery' exception
• Did Contains stop working on empty list in EF Core 8?
• LINQ "Contains" fails to generate SQL with custom converter
• error on working with explicit many-to-many relations with OnDelete.Restrict
• Lazy loader throwing invalid operation exceptions
• Cosmos provider v7.0.14 and v8.0.0 breaks previous OwnsMany behaviour
• Constructor not found for type 'Microsoft.EntityFrameworkCore.ChangeTracking.Internal.NullableClassCurrentProviderValueComparer
• Inconsistent behavior related to relationship cycle
• Property conversions are lost on base type is subtype is registered to model afterwards after upgrade to EFCore 8
• Incorrect parameter rewriting for string StartsWith/EndsWith/Contains
• Migrations bug when creating stored procedure with GOTO statement
• Unable to Scaffold DBContext if tables in SQL Server have certain names
• Contains translates to correlated query when the item is nullable
• FluentAPI configuration PrimitiveCollection on OwnedNavigationBuilder returns PropertyBuilder instead of PrimitiveCollectionBuilder
• String comparison fails when using const and compiled Models.
• Exception when writing a JSON column with negative enum value
• Getting errors when mixing DbFunction and SqlQueryRaw