There are many questions and answers and articles to this question available but in my opinion there seems to be no real clear/correct answer
For me Ayende has the best generic implementation so far that I've seen : http://ayende.com/blog/2500/generic-entity-equality
....But it is from 2007 ....
Is this the 'best way' to implement these methods especially with regard to NHibernate 3.2 which contains some differences in proxy implementation to earlier versions?
Implementing hashCode : if a class overrides equals, it must override hashCode. when they are both overridden, equals and hashCode must use the same set of fields. if two objects are equal, then their hashCode values must be equal as well.
You must override hashCode() in every class that overrides equals(). Failure to do so will result in a violation of the general contract for Object. hashCode(), which will prevent your class from functioning properly in conjunction with all hash-based collections, including HashMap, HashSet, and Hashtable.
If you're implementing a reference type, you should consider overriding the Equals method if your type looks like a base type, such as Point, String, BigNumber, and so on. Override the GetHashCode method to allow a type to work correctly in a hash table.
It's my understanding that the original GetHashCode() returns the memory address of the object, so it's essential to override it if you wish to compare two different objects.
You should be overriding Equals
and GetHashCode
. But, you shouldn't be doing value equality (Name == other.Name && Age == other.Age
), you should be doing identity equality!
If you don't, you will most likely run into comparing a proxy of an entity with the real entity and it will be miserable to debug. For example:
public class Blog : EntityBase<Blog>
{
public virtual string Name { get; set; }
// This would be configured to lazy-load.
public virtual IList<Post> Posts { get; protected set; }
public Blog()
{
Posts = new List<Post>();
}
public virtual Post AddPost(string title, string body)
{
var post = new Post() { Title = title, Body = body, Blog = this };
Posts.Add(post);
return post;
}
}
public class Post : EntityBase<Post>
{
public virtual string Title { get; set; }
public virtual string Body { get; set; }
public virtual Blog Blog { get; set; }
public virtual bool Remove()
{
return Blog.Posts.Remove(this);
}
}
void Main(string[] args)
{
var post = session.Load<Post>(postId);
// If we didn't override Equals, the comparisons for
// "Blog.Posts.Remove(this)" would all fail because of reference equality.
// We'd end up be comparing "this" typeof(Post) with a collection of
// typeof(PostProxy)!
post.Remove();
// If we *didn't* override Equals and *just* did
// "post.Blog.Posts.Remove(post)", it'd work because we'd be comparing
// typeof(PostProxy) with a collection of typeof(PostProxy) (reference
// equality would pass!).
}
Here is an example base class if you're using int
as your Id
(which could also be abstracted to any identity type):
public abstract class EntityBase<T>
where T : EntityBase<T>
{
public virtual int Id { get; protected set; }
protected bool IsTransient { get { return Id == 0; } }
public override bool Equals(object obj)
{
return EntityEquals(obj as EntityBase<T>);
}
protected bool EntityEquals(EntityBase<T> other)
{
if (other == null)
{
return false;
}
// One entity is transient and the other is not.
else if (IsTransient ^ other.IsTransient)
{
return false;
}
// Both entities are not saved.
else if (IsTransient && other.IsTransient)
{
return ReferenceEquals(this, other);
}
else
{
// Compare transient instances.
return Id == other.Id;
}
}
// The hash code is cached because a requirement of a hash code is that
// it does not change once calculated. For example, if this entity was
// added to a hashed collection when transient and then saved, we need
// the same hash code or else it could get lost because it would no
// longer live in the same bin.
private int? cachedHashCode;
public override int GetHashCode()
{
if (cachedHashCode.HasValue) return cachedHashCode.Value;
cachedHashCode = IsTransient ? base.GetHashCode() : Id.GetHashCode();
return cachedHashCode.Value;
}
// Maintain equality operator semantics for entities.
public static bool operator ==(EntityBase<T> x, EntityBase<T> y)
{
// By default, == and Equals compares references. In order to
// maintain these semantics with entities, we need to compare by
// identity value. The Equals(x, y) override is used to guard
// against null values; it then calls EntityEquals().
return Object.Equals(x, y);
}
// Maintain inequality operator semantics for entities.
public static bool operator !=(EntityBase<T> x, EntityBase<T> y)
{
return !(x == y);
}
}
My personal recommendation is not to implement these methods at all, because doing so forces loading in many cases where it isn't really necessary.
Also, if you don't move entities across sessions, you'll never need this. And even if you do, you can always compare by Id when needed.
If you love us? You can donate to us via Paypal or buy me a coffee so we can maintain and grow! Thank you!
Donate Us With