Note
The configuration in this section is applicable to relational databases in general. The extension methods shown here will become available when you install a relational database provider (due to the shared Microsoft.EntityFrameworkCore.Relational package).
Data type refers to the database specific type of the column to which a property is mapped.
Conventions
By convention, the database provider selects a data type based on the CLR type of the property. It also takes into account other metadata, such as the configured Maximum Length, whether the property is part of a primary key, etc.
For example, SQL Server uses datetime2(7) for DateTime properties, and nvarchar(max) for string properties (or nvarchar(450) for string properties that are used as a key).
Data Annotations
You can use Data Annotations to specify an exact data type for the column.
public class Blog
{
public int BlogId { get; set; }
[Column(TypeName = "varchar(200)")]
public string Url { get; set; }
}
public class Blog
{
public int BlogId { get; set; }
[Column(TypeName = "varchar(200)")]
public string Url { get; set; }
}
Fluent API
You can use the Fluent API to specify an exact data type for the column.
class MyContext : DbContext
{
public DbSet<Blog> Blogs { get; set; }
protected override void OnModelCreating(ModelBuilder modelBuilder)
{
modelBuilder.Entity<Blog>()
.Property(b => b.Url)
.HasColumnType("varchar(200)");
}
}
public class Blog
{
public int BlogId { get; set; }
public string Url { get; set; }
}