NHibernate - CreateCriteria vs CreateAlias

Question

Hi,

Assuming the following scenario:

class Project{
   public Job Job;
}

class Job{
   public Name;
}

Assuming I want to use the Criteria API to search for all projects whose Job has the name "sumthing".

I could use the CreateAlias to create an alias for Job and use it to access Name, or I could create a new Criteria for the property Job and search by Name.

Performance wise, is there any difference??

Answer 1

given these requirements there would be no difference, the generated SQL is the same: for mappings:

    <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?>
<hibernate-mapping xmlns="urn:nhibernate-mapping-2.2">
    <class name="Project" table="Project">
        <id name="Id" type="Int32" unsaved-value="0">
            <column name="Id" sql-type="int" not-null="true" unique="true"/>
            <generator class="native" />
        </id>
        <many-to-one name="Job" column="FK_JobId" cascade="save-update" not-null="true" />
    </class>
</hibernate-mapping>
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?>
<hibernate-mapping xmlns="urn:nhibernate-mapping-2.2">
    <class name="Job" table="Job">
        <id name="Id" type="Int32" unsaved-value="0">
            <column name="Id" sql-type="int" not-null="true" unique="true"/>
            <generator class="native" />
        </id>
        <property name="Name" type="String">
            <column name="Name" sql-type="nvarchar" length="50" not-null="true"/>
        </property>
    </class>
</hibernate-mapping>

and classes

public class Project
    {
        public Project() { }

        public virtual int Id { get; set; }

        public virtual Job Job { get; set; }
    }
public class Job
    {
        public Job() { }

        public virtual int Id { get; set; }

        public virtual String Name { get; set; }
    }

these criteria definitions

ICriteria criteriacrit = session
  .CreateCriteria(typeof (Project))
  .CreateCriteria("Job", "job")
  .Add(Restrictions.Eq("job.Name", "sometextA"));

ICriteria aliascrit = session
  .CreateCriteria(typeof (Project))
  .CreateAlias("Job", "job")
  .Add(Restrictions.Eq("job.Name", "sometextB"));

generate the same SQL

SELECT 
  this_.Id as Id2_1_, 
  this_.FK_JobId as FK2_2_1_, 
  job1_.Id as Id1_0_, 
  job1_.Name as Name1_0_ 
FROM 
  Project this_ 
  inner join Job job1_ 
    on this_.FK_JobId=job1_.Id 
WHERE job1_.Name = @p0; @p0 = 'sometextA'

SELECT 
  this_.Id as Id2_1_, 
  this_.FK_JobId as FK2_2_1_, 
  job1_.Id as Id1_0_, 
  job1_.Name as Name1_0_ 
FROM
  Project this_ 
  inner join Job job1_ 
    on this_.FK_JobId=job1_.Id 
WHERE job1_.Name = @p0; @p0 = 'sometextB'

note however that the CreateAlias relies on the mappings to generate associations whereas the CreateCriteria call allows to specify JoinType.

so, these calls

ICriteria criteriacrit = session
  .CreateCriteria(typeof(Project))
  .CreateCriteria("Job",JoinType.LeftOuterJoin)
  .Add(Restrictions.Eq("Name", "sometextA"));

ICriteria aliascrit = session
  .CreateCriteria(typeof (Project))
  .CreateAlias("Job", "job")
  .Add(Restrictions.Eq("job.Name", "sometextB"));

generate these SQL statements

SELECT 
  this_.Id as Id2_1_, 
  this_.FK_JobId as FK2_2_1_, 
  job1_.Id as Id1_0_, 
  job1_.Name as Name1_0_ 
FROM 
  Project this_ 
  **left outer** join Job job1_
    on this_.FK_JobId=job1_.Id 
WHERE job1_.Name = @p0; @p0 = 'sometextA'

SELECT 
  this_.Id as Id2_1_, 
  this_.FK_JobId as FK2_2_1_, 
  job1_.Id as Id1_0_, 
  job1_.Name as Name1_0_ 
FROM Project this_ 
  **inner join** Job job1_ 
    on this_.FK_JobId=job1_.Id 
WHERE job1_.Name = @p0; @p0 = 'sometextB'

Answer 2

createAlias() returns original criteria as is result createCriteria() returns new criteria constructed with createCriteria

difference will be when chaining methods e.g.

cr.createAlias().add(Restrictions.ilike("code","abc")) will add restriction to entity cr.createCriteria("parent","p").add(Restrictions.ilike("code","abc")) will add restriction to its parent