Important to note that this isn’t a true example by any measure. It merely shows what to put in your App.config (especially since the official documentation mostly covers the Java version, which naturally has no idea what App.config is. And what little there is for NHibernate, is for the last release.

The example is very simple, it mainly shows:

• The contents of App.config

• An example *.hbm.xml file for the sample User class.

• If you should wish, the whole Visual Studio 2008 Solution file

I used Visual C# 2008 Express Edition and for the database I used SQL Server Express 2005 (make sure to get both “Microsoft SQL Server 2005 Express Edition ” and “SQL Server Management Studio Express”, the latter part is the GUI to manage the database, unless talking pure SQL into one end of a pipe satisfies you).

Download the entire VS 2008 Solution.

Configs, etc

The App.config looks like

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?>
<configuration>
  <configSections>
    <section name="hibernate-configuration"
             type="NHibernate.Cfg.ConfigurationSectionHandler, NHibernate" />
  </configSections>
  <hibernate-configuration xmlns="urn:nhibernate-configuration-2.2" >
    <session-factory>
      <property name="dialect">
        NHibernate.Dialect.MsSql2005Dialect
      </property>
      <property name="connection.provider">
        NHibernate.Connection.DriverConnectionProvider
      </property>
      <property name="connection.driver_class">
        NHibernate.Driver.SqlClientDriver
      </property>
      <property name="connection.connection_string">
        Server=SVENDSDESKTOP\SQLEXPRESS;
        Database=NHibernate;
        Integrated Security=True;
      </property>
    </session-factory>
  </hibernate-configuration>
</configuration>

The NHibernateTest.User.hbm.xml:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?>
<hibernate-mapping xmlns="urn:nhibernate-mapping-2.2" namespace="NHibernateTest">
  <class name="User, NHibernateTest" table="users">
    <id name="Id" column="LogonId" type="String" length="20">
      <generator class="assigned" />
    </id>
    <property name="UserName" column="Name" type="String" length="40"/>
    <property name="Password" type="String" length="20"/>
    <property name="EmailAddress" type="String" length="40"/>
    <property name="LastLogon" type="DateTime"/>
  </class>
</hibernate-mapping>

And the startup code is the following.

static void Main(string[] args)
{
    Configuration cfg = new Configuration();
    cfg.AddXmlFile("NHibernateTest.User.hbm.xml");

    ISessionFactory factory = cfg.BuildSessionFactory();
    ISession session = factory.OpenSession();
    ITransaction transaction = session.BeginTransaction();

    User newUser = new User();
    newUser.Id = "joe_cool";
    newUser.UserName = "Joseph Cool";
    newUser.Password = "abc123";
    newUser.EmailAddress = "joe@cool.com";
    newUser.LastLogon = DateTime.Now;

    // Tell NHibernate that this object should be saved
    session.Save(newUser);

    // commit all of the changes to the DB and close the ISession
    transaction.Commit();
    session.Close();
}

Annnd, the SQL needed would be the following. Note that the database used is “NHibernate”.

USE [NHibernate]
GO
/****** Object:  Table [dbo].[users]    Script Date: 07/23/2008 22:32:00 ******/
SET ANSI_NULLS ON
GO
SET QUOTED_IDENTIFIER ON
GO
CREATE TABLE [dbo].[users](
	[LogonID] [nvarchar](20) NOT NULL DEFAULT ('0'),
	[Name] [nvarchar](40) NULL DEFAULT (NULL),
	[Password] [nvarchar](20) NULL DEFAULT (NULL),
	[EmailAddress] [nvarchar](40) NULL DEFAULT (NULL),
	[LastLogon] [datetime] NULL DEFAULT (NULL),
PRIMARY KEY CLUSTERED
(
	[LogonID] ASC
)WITH (PAD_INDEX  = OFF,
       STATISTICS_NORECOMPUTE  = OFF,
       IGNORE_DUP_KEY = OFF,
       ALLOW_ROW_LOCKS  = ON,
       ALLOW_PAGE_LOCKS  = ON) ON [PRIMARY]
) ON [PRIMARY]

Navigation

Debug

Editing

Other

Configuring shortcuts

I’m using a danish keyboard, so the ctrl+- shortcut does not work for me for whatever reason. You can customize your shortcuts by going Tools -> Customize -> Keyboard … Which brings you to the following dialog.

Visual Studio keyboard customization dialog

You’ll need to locate the shortcut your want to configure first (and there’s loads). Type in “back” into the “Show commands containing:”. You should find “View.NavigateBackwards” a bit down the last. You can bind it to something else, I use ctrl+´, but whatever works for you.

Other shortcuts

As you can see from the list, the amount of bindable actions is very large, and as far as I know not documented at all. Further, they also assume a US keyboard layout (and despite of old faithfull , I’m currently on a Danish keyboard, as it just does make some things easier). But that said, Coding Horror has a great script that will enumerate all of the short cuts, their name, and what object they belong to (View, Edit, etc). Microsoft also has some great looking posters for VB, C# and C++

• Visual C# 2008 Keybinding Reference Poster (and for 2005)

• Visual Basic 2008 Keybinding Reference Poster

• Visual C++ 2008 Keybinding Reference Poster

But since those aren’t editable, and I’m just not sure I need that many short cuts, I’ve compiled my own little Word document I’ll print out, and also list my own bindings in.