Include functionality improvements about specification

[fiseni]

Let's first examine what are our current limitations, and what we trying to achieve here.
This is how we use the Include for now.

    public class BlogWithPostsAndAuthorSpec : BaseSpecification<Blog>
    {
        public BlogWithPostsAndAuthorSpec(int id) : base(b => b.Id == id)
        {
            AddIncludes(x => x.Include(b => b.Posts)
                              .ThenInclude(p => p.Author)
            );
        }
    }

This is great, but we have the following issues:

• We can't use ThenInclude more than once. It's not chainable, so we can include 2nd level only.
• The implementation ultimately converts the expression into string. We're passing the string to EF Include methods, and not the expressions.
• From the usage perspective, the expressions are set within the AddIncludes method, which is a bit confusing.

The improved version looks as following:

    public class BlogWithPostsAndAuthorSpec : BaseSpecification<Blog>
    {
        public BlogWithPostsAndAuthorSpec(int id) : base(b => b.Id == id)
        {
            // We can chain as much as we want
            Query.Include(b => b.Posts)
                 .ThenInclude(p => p.Author)
                 .ThenInclude(a => a.Posts)
                 .ThenInclude(p => p.Author);

            // We can start over with Include for another navigation
            Query.Include(a => a.Posts)
                 .ThenInclude(p => p.Author);

            // We can chain it with other methods
            Query.Where(b => b.Name == "Something")
                 .Include(b => b.Posts)
                 .ThenInclude(p => p.Author);
        }
    }

The existing Include infrastructure won't be used, we won't need the aggregator and the Visitor pattern at all.

[fiseni]

The usage now is as following (we can chain several levels if we want):

    public class CompanyWithStoresThenIncludeProductsSpec : Specification<Company>
    {
        public CompanyWithStoresThenIncludeProductsSpec(int id)
        {
            Query.Where(x => x.Id == id)
                 .Include(x => x.Stores)
                     .ThenInclude(x => x.Products);
        }
    }

Notice
The usage will be as we planned, and it has same syntax as the EF. But, I decided all those expressions to be parsed to string and stored as string, then in evaluator utilize navigationPropertyPath of EF include. This is done based on the following reasons:

• I was doing some tests, and was surprised to find that passing string (navigation path) to EF Include, actually works faster. (probably while evaluating the expression there are a lot of checks etc).
• If we want to keep the inputs as expressions in the specifications, the actual problem is storing them. For example, we can't use Expression<Func<object, object>>, the delegate argument shouldn't be object. Thus, we have to store Types too, and then in the evaluator we should reconstruct the whole expressions, and call the EF Include through reflection. I did this, and honestly it creates unnecessary complexity in the solution. It defies the purpose.

[fiseni]

This is implemented in version 4. I'm closing the issue. If anyone has additional comments or suggestions, please feel free to reply or re-open the issue.