MySql Connector/NET 6.7.3 Beta 2 has been released

MySQL Connector/Net 6.7.3, a new version of the all-managed .NET driver for MySQL has been released.  This is the second beta release intended to introduce users to the new features in the release. This release is feature complete, it should be stable enough for users to understand the new features and how we expect them to work. As is the case with all non-GA releases, it should not be used in any production environment. It is appropriate for use with MySQL server versions 5.0-5.7.

It is now available in source and binary form from http://dev.mysql.com/downloads/connector/net/#downloads and mirror sites (note that not all mirror sites may be up to date at this point-if you can't find this version on some mirror, please try again later or choose another download site.)

The 6.7 version of MySQL Connector/Net brings the following new features:

WinRT Connector.

Load Balancing support.

Entity Framework 5.0 support.

Memcached support for Innodb Memcached plugin.

This version also splits the product in two: from now on, starting version 6.7, Connector/NET will include only the former Connector/NET ADO.NET driver, Entity Framework and ASP.NET providers (Core libraries of MySql.Data, MySql.Data.Entity & MySql.Web). While all the former product Visual Studio integration (Design support, Intellisense, Debugger) will be released in a separated plugin for Visual Studio product.

WinRT Connector

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The major feature introduced in this Beta. Now you can write MySql data access apps in Windows Runtime (aka Store Apps) using the familiar API of Connector/NET for .NET.

The supported classes MySqlConnection, MySqlCommand, MySqlDataReader, MySqlScript, MySqlTransaction, MySqlParameter, MySqlConnectionStringBuilder and support classes.

Features added in this release are Transactions, Blob types, All parameter types, script execution, & access control for stored routines.

Features not supported in this release:

- Authentication with other protocols than native mysql (specifically sha256 & windows integrated security).

- SSL encryption for connections.

Known issues:

- Due to indeterministic RT Garbage Collection, is better to explicitly call Close/Dispose on a connection than setting reference to null.

Other features not planned to be supported:

- MySqlCommandBuilder

- Entity Framework

- ASP.NET Providers.

Load Balancing Support

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Now you can setup a Replication or Cluster configuration in the backend, and Connector/NET will balance the load of queries among all servers making up the backend topology.

Entity Framework 5.0

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Connector/NET is now compatible with EF 5, including special features of EF 5 like spatial types.

Memcached

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Just setup Innodb memcached plugin and use Connector/NET new APIs to establish a client to MySql 5.6 server's memcached daemon.

Bug fixes included in this release:

- Fix for bug in Replication & load balancing (Oracle bug #16762427)

- Added support for Entity Framework 5.0 when using .net 4.0, including Code First Migrations (WorkItem #228).

- Fix for bug Readme and licence files are not updated with "2013" text (Oracle bug # 16630533).

- Fix for bug Dbupdateexception saving changes (Oracle bug # 16494585).

Enjoy and thanks for the support!