NHibernate - object-relational mapper for .NET

NHibernate is a mature, open source object-relational mapper for the .NET framework. NHibernate is a port of Hibernate Core for Java to the .NET Framework. It handles persisting plain .NET objects to and from an underlying relational database.

NHibernate supports transparent persistence, your object classes don't have to follow a restrictive programming model. Persistent classes do not need to implement any interface or inherit from a special base class. This makes it possible to design the business logic using plain .NET (CLR) objects and object-oriented idiom.

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• Natural programming model - NHibernate supports natural OO idiom; inheritance, polymorphism, composition and the .NET collections framework, including generic collections.

• Native .NET - NHibernate API uses .NET conventions and idioms

• Support for fine-grained object models - a rich variety of mappings for collections and dependent objects

• No build-time bytecode enhancement - there's no extra code generation or bytecode processing steps in your build procedure

• The query options - NHibernate addresses both sides of the problem; not only how to get objects into the database, but also how to get them out again

• Custom SQL - specify the exact SQL that NHibernate should use to persist your objects. Stored procedures are supported on Microsoft SQL Server.

• Support for "conversations" - NHibernate supports long-lived persistence contexts, detach/reattach of objects, and takes care of optimistic locking automatically