NHibernate is a mature, open source object-relational mapper for the .NET framework. The term object/relational mapping (ORM) refers to the technique of mapping a data representation from an object model to a relational data model with a SQL-based schema.
NHibernate not only takes care of the mapping from .NET classes to database tables (and from .NET data types to SQL data types), but also provides data query and retrieval facilities and can significantly reduce development time otherwise spent with manual data handling in SQL and ADO.NET.
The goal is to relieve the developer from 95 percent of common data persistence related programming tasks. NHibernate may not be the best solution for data-centric applications that only use stored-procedures to implement the business logic in the database, it is most useful with object-oriented domain models and business logic in the .NET-based middle-tier. However, NHibernate can certainly help you to remove or encapsulate vendor-specific SQL code and will help with the common task of result set translation from a tabular representation to a graph of objects.
It’s actively developed, fully featured and used in thousands of successful projects.
NHibernate is free and open source software.
Features include:
- Visual Studio friendly – easily map regular C# or VB.NET object models designed in Visual Studio. No special base classes or attributes needed. Fully supports inheritance, components and enums.
- Fast development cycle – generates database tables from your domain models. Supports all popular relational databases. Supports the most complex legacy scenarios.
- Many plugins and tools – full Text Search. Cluster-scoped caching with Microsoft Velocity & Memcached. Business validation rules. ReSharper plugin. Castle Active Record. S#arp Architecture. And many more.
- Established community.
Website: nhibernate.info
Support: Tutorial, GitHub Code Repository
Developer: NHibernate Community
License: GNU Lesser General Public License v2.1
NHibernate is written in C#. Learn C# with our recommended free books and free tutorials.
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