Entity Developer has the following key features:
Entity Developer allows you to create and edit NHibernate, Entity Framework, Entity Framework Core, LinqConnect, Telerik Data Access, and LINQ to SQL models visually, without writing XML code. It supports creating all kinds of mapping, such as table splitting, mapping entity to several tables, complex types, inheritance hierarchies, creating entities from SELECT statements and methods from SQL code, etc. Entity Developer is distributed individually and is also included into the professional edition of dotConnect for Oracle, PostgreSQL, MySQL, SQLite, Salesforce, dotConnect providers for cloud apps, and to LinqConnect.
Entity Developer supports NHibernate, Entity Framework, Entity Framework Core, LinqConnect, Telerik Data Access, and LINQ to SQL models. It offers a separate edition for each of the supported ORMs and the Professional Edition, which supports four ORMs: NHibernate, Entity Framework, Telerik Data Access, and LINQ to SQL.
Entity Developer supports both Model-First and Database-First approaches and allows you even to change approaches in the middle of the development process. To keep data within the database and model consistent, the Update to Database and Update from Database wizards are used.
Code generation is very flexible due to using T4-like templates, allowing virtually anything you may want for code generation. C# and VB code can be generated for your model out-of-the-box, and you may even create your own templates for other programming languages. Besides, Entity Developer enables flexible customization of the generated code output, including specifying project and project folder or the file system path for output. Furthermore, Entity Developer allows you to specify custom .NET attributes, that will be present in the generated code, for model objects, and declare and set extended properties of model objects at design-time.
Entity Developer seamlessly integrates with Visual Studio 2008, 2010, 2012, 2013, 2015, and 2017, but can be used as a stand-alone application.
Entity Developer provides powerful features to automate or speed-up common model editing operations. Really intuitive Entity Developer drag-n-drop allows you to perform a range of actions in a couple of clicks. Advanced model refactoring features go even further and allow such operations as creating a TPC inheritance hierarchy from a group of classes or extracting common properties from several classes to a complex type to be performed almost instantly.
Entity Developer supports creating all kinds of mapping such as table splitting, mapping entity to several tables, complex types, enum types, inheritance hierarchies, creating entities from SELECT statements and methods from SQL code, etc.
Entity Developer allows you to edit storage model in the GUI, without editing XML manually.
Entity Developer allows retrieving and editing data from database tables and views, retrieving data from entities to validate the mapping and testing your model with LINQ to Entities, HQL and Entity SQL queries while designing your model. You don't need to compile your application or create any test code for it.
Entity Developer always validates your model while you are editing it and highlights errors on diagrams. All errors and warnings automatically appear in the Error List window. If you are using an Entity Framework model and there are unused complex types or stored procedures in it, Entity Developer displays the corresponding warning messages in the Error List window.
Entity Developer offers several features that are very useful for working with large models containing hundreds of entities. First of all, you can make your model more comprehensible by means of creating multiple diagrams for a model with each diagram containing a part of entities grouped on the basis of some criteria. Moreover, you can search for an object on all model diagrams, where it is present, even if they are closed. Entity Developer provides the ability to split a model into several diagrams manually or automatically when creating it using Database-First approach. Entity Developer also has a built-in ability to enable view pregeneration for speeding up the first query execution in run-time for Entity Framework models, etc.
Entity Developer provides a number of features designed for diagram layout customization. Selection-driven highlighting improves diagram readability. Complex and enum types are displayed on the diagram with their specific display options. You can change diagram skins and shape colors, add sticker notes with comments and stamps specifying diagram author, company, version, copyrights, etc. The diagram has a context menu, which allows managing the layout and settings of the diagram and model, and working with the model.