When defining an entity with a DatabaseGeneratedOption.Identity value with Entity Framework Code First, you can now leave this column out of the column list for an INSERT or UPDATE statement. This feature is especially useful for defining a column with a default value corresponding to the CURRENT_TIMESTAMP() return value:

[DatabaseGenerated(DatabaseGeneratedOption.Identity)] 
public DateTime DateCreated { get; set; } 

(Bug #15935094)

Connector/Net now supports the MySQL 5.6 feature to store connection-specific data in the server. A Connector/Net application can supply to the server a list of key/value pairs at login time. When you specify the connection option Connect_Attrs, a predefined set of attribute values is sent to the server. Connector/Net automatically transmits the following attributes:

To examine these connection-specific attributes on the server, query the Performance Schema tables described in Performance Schema Connection Attribute Tables. (Bug #15935112)

Connector/Net now supports the MySQL 5.6 password expiration protocol. See ALTER USER for the syntax to expire the password for a user. When you open a connection through Connection/Net that logs in as a user with an expired password, any statement issued through the connection produces a SET PASSWORD exception. When you create a connection in Visual Studio Server Explorer to a user with an expired password, a dialog prompts for a new password, after which the connection succeeds. (Bug #15935104)

Connector/Net now supports SHA-256 hashing for user account passwords. After you create an account following the steps outlined in The SHA-256 Authentication Plugin, just open a Connector/Net connection passing user and password. This feature works in both SSL and non-SSL secured connections. (Bug #15935128)

If a DateTime type in MySQL 5.6 was defined with milliseconds precision using Entity Framework Code First or EF Model First, the expected DateTime(n) column did not include the precision specification. (Bug #15972773)

Calling the method FirstOrDefault “LINQ to Entities” queries caused a System.Data.EntityCommandCompilationException exception. (Bug #15856964, Bug #67377)

Connection attempts using IPV6 addresses in Connector/Net would fail. (Bug #14835718, Bug #67253)

Visual Studio 2012 projects could sometimes give the following error dialog:

Failed to merge object(s). 

Keyword not supported. 
Parameter name: AttachDbFilename. 

This issue affected mostly VisualStudio 2012 projects, either migrated from VisualStudio 2010 or including web sites created with VS2010, connecting to a MySQL 5.5 server. (Bug #14733472, Bug #66880)

In Visual Studio 2005, adding a new data connection through the Server Explorer produced an error message: Package Load Failure. The Visual Studio plugin was dynamically linked against VS2008 version of assembly Microsoft.VisualStudio.Data (v9.0). The fixed plugin links with the VS2005 version (v8.0) of that library instead instead, which is upward compatible with later Visual Studio versions. (Bug #13491674, Bug #63073)

The medium trust support using the MySQLClientPermissions class is now more flexible: in addition to the original deployment method, where the library is installed in the Global Assembly Cache (GAC), you can also install the library within a bin or lib folder inside the project or solution. When the library is deployed somewhere other than the GAC, the only protocol supported is TCP/IP. Existing applications that use the library installed in the GAC must now include an extra connection option, includesecurityasserts=true. For details, see Working with Partial Trust / Medium Trust. (Bug #14668820, Bug #65036)

Since Connector/Net 6.5, TIMESTAMP values have been returned as DateTime objects with a kind property of Local rather than Unspecified. MySqlDataReader.GetDateTime() should have returned a date with a kind property of UTC when the time_zone connection property was utc. With this fix, if time_zone is UTC, Kind is also UTC; otherwise, Kind is Local.

To work with multiple servers with different timezones, change the time_zone setting to UTC in all MySqlConnection objects. For example, if you issue the command:

set @@global.time_zone = '+0:00', 

With Kind = UTC, you can use .NET standard APIs to translate between time zones for frontend applications when required. (Bug #14740705, Bug #66964)

When an application starts up, creates a connection, and then goes idle after a single database operation, the connections are now cleaned up more quickly: typically after an idle time of 3 minutes rather than 6 minutes. This optimization is especially useful for ASP.net applications on low-traffic sites. (Bug #14652624, Bug #66472)

You can now write a custom authentication plugin, taking advantage of the pluggable authentication feature available in MySQL 5.5.16 and higher. See Writing a Custom Authentication Plugin for details.

Under some circumstances, setting CacheServerProperties=true in the connection string could cause a Packet too large error. With connection pooling enabled and CacheServerProperties=true, the first connection worked as expected, but the second, third, and so on connections would fail if the query exceeded 1024 bytes. (Bug #14593547, Bug #66578)

Connector/Net did not support creating an entity with a key of type string. During database creation, a MySqlException was thrown saying BLOB/TEXT column 'Name' used in key specification without a key length. The DDL produced by the provider specified a MEDIUMTEXT column for the primary key without specifying a length for the key. This fix is particularly important when working with Entity Framework versions 4.3 and later, since the __MigrationsHitory table (which replaces the EdmMetadata table) uses a string property as its key. (Bug #14540202, Bug #65289, Bug #64288)

The ExecuteNonQuery() could return an error Parameter '?' must be defined, when attempting to execute a statement such as:

insert into table_name (Field1, Field1) VALUES(?,?)

That is, when referencing the same field twice with two different ? placeholders. (Bug #14499549, Bug #66060)

Customizing precision by calling the HasPrecision() method within the OnModelCreating() method in a Code First project would always produce precision settings (10,2) rather than the specified precision. (Bug #14469048, Bug #65001)

The MySQL Connector/Net EntityFramework provider would throw NullReferenceException when trying to insert a new record with an empty VALUES clause. Such an INSERT should work when the only required (NOT NULL) column in the table is a primary key auto-increment column. (Bug #14479715, Bug #66066)

When building commands through the MySql.Data.MySqlClient.MySqlCommand() class, memory could be leaked because some IO.MemoryStream instances were not being freed efficiently. The memory leak could be an issue in SQL-heavy applications, for example a logging application processing large numbers of INSERT statements. (Bug #14468204, Bug #65696)

Using the Entity Data Model Designer decimal type and CreateDatabase function, the values were stored with 0 digits at the right of the decimal point. With this fix, the default is 2 digits to the right of the decimal point, and any precision specified through the Entity Data Model Designer is applied correctly. (Bug #14474342, Bug #65127)

When using a MySQL database set up as UTF32 as an ASP.net membership database, web applications could give a “key too long” error, and the Website Administration Tool would not connect to providers. The cause was that the column my_aspnet_sessions.SessionId, when converted from Latin1 character set to UTF32 with 4 bytes per character, exceeded the length limit for a primary key:

Specified key was too long; max key length is 767 bytes

(Bug #14495292, Bug #65144)

When using the ASP.net web security functionality with a MySQL database, using features that access the my_aspnet_usersinroles table caused an exception:

MySql.Data.MySqlClient.MySqlException: Table 'testdb.my_aspnet_usersinrole' doesn't exist.

For example, this error could occur when trying to remove the user from a role or find users in a role. The fix corrects the spelling of the table name to my_aspnet_usersinroles. (Bug #14405338, Bug #65805)

Although the member variable MySqlCommand.LastInsertedId was a 64-bit long, its value was effectively capped at the maximum value of Int32 (2,147,483,647). If a primary key exceeded this value, the value of LastInsertedId was wrong. This mismatch could be an issue for tables with large numbers of rows. (Bug #14171960, Bug #65452)

When using the Entity Framework Code First approach, the generated code could be use the MEDIUMTEXT data type in contexts where other types such as VARCHAR were more appropriate, leading to errors such as:

error 0064: Facet 'MaxLength' must not be specified for type 'mediumtext'.

(Bug #13582335, Bug #63920)

This beta release removes several of the earlier limitations on stored procedure debugging:

These limitations remain:

Stored procedure debugging in Microsoft Visual Studio.

Entity Framework 4.3 Code First support.

Pluggable authentication (not available in this alpha).

To support the Entity Framework 4.3.1, Connector/Net can now use the Code First approach when developing against a model, and keep track of the changes in the Entity Model and in the Database. This new Entity Framework 4.3.1 feature is focused in allowing your database to be updated along with your Code First Model changes.

The Connector/Net integration with Visual Studio now includes stored procedure debugging. It works in a very intuitive manner, by simply clicking Debug Routine from Server Explorer. The limitations in this preliminary alpha release include:

When using Entity Framework with Connector/Net, the association property OnDelete was not taken into account in the CreateDatabaseScript function of the ObjectContext, leading to an error message System.Data.UpdateException was unhandled. The SQL generated by the CreateDatabaseScript function was missing ON DELETE and ON UPDATE clauses. These clauses were filled in correctly by the DDL generation wizard. (Bug #14008752, Bug #64779)

A call to a stored procedure or function in an application using the Code First entity framework could result in an error:

Unhandled Exception: MySql.Data.MySqlClient.MySqlException: You have an error 
in your SQL syntax; ...

The code change allows syntax such as the following to invoke a stored procedure, without using the CALL statement and without using CommandType.StoredProcedure.

int count = myContext.Database.SqlQuery<int>("GetCount").First(); 

(Bug #14008699, Bug #64999)

When using the Entity Framework Code First approach, the generated code could be incorrect:

(Bug #13900091, Bug #64216)