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LINQ to Raisers Edge NXT Data


LINQ offers versatile querying capabilities within the .NET Framework (v3.0+), offering a straightforward method for programmatic data access through CData ADO.NET Data Providers. In this article, we demonstrate the use of LINQ to retrieve information from the Raisers Edge NXT Data Provider.

This article illustrates using LINQ to access tables within the Raisers Edge NXT via the CData ADO.NET Data Provider for Raisers Edge NXT. To achieve this, we will use LINQ to Entity Framework, which facilitates the generation of connections and can be seamlessly employed with any CData ADO.NET Data Providers to access data through LINQ.

See the help documentation for a guide to setting up an EF 6 project to use the provider.

  1. In a new project in Visual Studio, right-click on the project and choose to add a new item. Add an ADO.NET Entity Data Model.
  2. Choose EF Designer from Database and click Next.
  3. Add a new Data Connection, and change your data source type to "CData Raisers Edge NXT Data Source".

  4. Enter your data source connection information.

    Before establishing a connection, supply the SubscriptionKey, found in the Blackbaud Raiser's Edge NXT Profile.

    Authenticating to Raiser's Edge NXT

    Blackbaud Raiser's Edge NXT uses the OAuth authentication standard. You can connect to without setting any connection properties using the embedded OAuth credentials.

    Alternatively, you can authenticate by creating a custom app to obtain the OAuthClientId, OAuthClientSecret, and CallbackURL connection properties.

    See the Help documentation for an authentication guide.

    Below is a typical connection string:

    SubscriptionKey=MySubscriptionKey;OAuthClientId=MyOAuthClientId;OAuthClientSecret=MyOAuthClientSecret;CallbackURL=http://localhost:33333;InitiateOAuth=GETANDREFRESH
  5. If saving your entity connection to App.Config, set an entity name. In this example we are setting RaiserEdgeNXTEntities as our entity connection in App.Config.
  6. Enter a model name and select any tables or views you would like to include in the model.

Using the entity you created, you can now perform select commands. For example:

RaiserEdgeNXTEntities context = new RaiserEdgeNXTEntities(); var constituentsQuery = from constituents in context.Constituents select constituents; foreach (var result in constituentsQuery) { Console.WriteLine("{0} {1} ", result.Id, result.Id); }

See "LINQ and Entity Framework" chapter in the help documentation for example queries of the supported LINQ.

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