I have a project that uses Entity Framework. While calling SaveChanges on my DbContext, I get the following exception:
System.Data.Entity.Validation.DbEntityValidationException: Validation failed for one or more entities. See 'EntityValidationErrors' property for more details.
This is all fine and dandy, but I don't want to attach a debugger every time this exception occurs. More over, in production environments I cannot easily attach a debugger so I have to go to great lengths to reproduce these errors.
How can I see the details hidden within the DbEntityValidationException?
This question is related to
c#
entity-framework
The easiest solution is to override SaveChanges on your entities class. You can catch the DbEntityValidationException, unwrap the actual errors and create a new DbEntityValidationException with the improved message.
Your exception message will now look like this:
System.Data.Entity.Validation.DbEntityValidationException: Validation failed for one or more entities. See 'EntityValidationErrors' property for more details. The validation errors are: The field PhoneNumber must be a string or array type with a maximum length of '12'; The LastName field is required.
You can drop the overridden SaveChanges in any class that inherits from DbContext:
public partial class SomethingSomethingEntities
{
public override int SaveChanges()
{
try
{
return base.SaveChanges();
}
catch (DbEntityValidationException ex)
{
// Retrieve the error messages as a list of strings.
var errorMessages = ex.EntityValidationErrors
.SelectMany(x => x.ValidationErrors)
.Select(x => x.ErrorMessage);
// Join the list to a single string.
var fullErrorMessage = string.Join("; ", errorMessages);
// Combine the original exception message with the new one.
var exceptionMessage = string.Concat(ex.Message, " The validation errors are: ", fullErrorMessage);
// Throw a new DbEntityValidationException with the improved exception message.
throw new DbEntityValidationException(exceptionMessage, ex.EntityValidationErrors);
}
}
}
The DbEntityValidationException also contains the entities that caused the validation errors. So if you require even more information, you can change the above code to output information about these entities.
See also: http://devillers.nl/improving-dbentityvalidationexception/
Use try block in your code like
try
{
// Your code...
// Could also be before try if you know the exception occurs in SaveChanges
context.SaveChanges();
}
catch (DbEntityValidationException e)
{
foreach (var eve in e.EntityValidationErrors)
{
Console.WriteLine("Entity of type \"{0}\" in state \"{1}\" has the following validation errors:",
eve.Entry.Entity.GetType().Name, eve.Entry.State);
foreach (var ve in eve.ValidationErrors)
{
Console.WriteLine("- Property: \"{0}\", Error: \"{1}\"",
ve.PropertyName, ve.ErrorMessage);
}
}
throw;
}
You can check the details here as well
To quickly find a meaningful error message by inspecting the error during debugging:
Add a quick watch for:
((System.Data.Entity.Validation.DbEntityValidationException)$exception).EntityValidationErrors
Drill down into EntityValidationErrors like this:
(collection item e.g. [0]) > ValidationErrors > (collection item e.g. [0]) > ErrorMessage
As Martin indicated, there is more information in the DbEntityValidationResult. I found it useful to get both my POCO class name and property name in each message, and wanted to avoid having to write custom ErrorMessage attributes on all my [Required] tags just for this.
The following tweak to Martin's code took care of these details for me:
// Retrieve the error messages as a list of strings.
List<string> errorMessages = new List<string>();
foreach (DbEntityValidationResult validationResult in ex.EntityValidationErrors)
{
string entityName = validationResult.Entry.Entity.GetType().Name;
foreach (DbValidationError error in validationResult.ValidationErrors)
{
errorMessages.Add(entityName + "." + error.PropertyName + ": " + error.ErrorMessage);
}
}
Actually, this is just the validation issue, EF will validate the entity properties first before making any changes to the database. So, EF will check whether the property's value is out of range, like when you designed the table. Table_Column_UserName is varchar(20). But, in EF, you entered a value that longer than 20. Or, in other cases, if the column does not allow to be a Null. So, in the validation process, you have to set a value to the not null column, no matter whether you are going to make the change on it. I personally, like the Leniel Macaferi answer. It can show you the detail of the validation issues
For Azure Functions we use this simple extension to Microsoft.Extensions.Logging.ILogger
public static class LoggerExtensions
{
public static void Error(this ILogger logger, string message, Exception exception)
{
if (exception is DbEntityValidationException dbException)
{
message += "\nValidation Errors: ";
foreach (var error in dbException.EntityValidationErrors.SelectMany(entity => entity.ValidationErrors))
{
message += $"\n * Field name: {error.PropertyName}, Error message: {error.ErrorMessage}";
}
}
logger.LogError(default(EventId), exception, message);
}
}
and example usage:
try
{
do something with request and EF
}
catch (Exception e)
{
log.Error($"Failed to create customer due to an exception: {e.Message}", e);
return await StringResponseUtil.CreateResponse(HttpStatusCode.InternalServerError, e.Message);
}
To view the EntityValidationErrors collection, add the following Watch expression to the Watch window.
((System.Data.Entity.Validation.DbEntityValidationException)$exception).EntityValidationErrors
I'm using visual studio 2013
While you are in debug mode within the catch {...} block open up the "QuickWatch" window (ctrl+alt+q) and paste in there:
((System.Data.Entity.Validation.DbEntityValidationException)ex).EntityValidationErrors
This will allow you to drill down into the ValidationErrors tree. It's the easiest way I've found to get instant insight into these errors.
For Visual 2012+ users who care only about the first error and might not have a catch block, you can even do:
((System.Data.Entity.Validation.DbEntityValidationException)$exception).EntityValidationErrors.First().ValidationErrors.First().ErrorMessage
I think "The actual validation errors" may contain sensitive information, and this could be the reason why Microsoft chose to put them in another place (properties). The solution marked here is practical, but it should be taken with caution.
I would prefer to create an extension method. More reasons to this:
Source: Stackoverflow.com