ADO.Net Entity Framework
And another post from Steve Eichert goes into the Bloglines cache for remebering to follow up on later.
I’m intrigued by Microsoft offering some sort of Entity framework, as there are several open source ones available. I am curious how this new Entity framework will fit with DLINQ, as that seems to be a very easy persistence mechanism, however it is based on Attributes for the mapping, whereas it seems this new framework will be driven by xml. I wonder if MS has gotten so big that separate product groups could be working on similar technologies and not realize it, and then release different solutions to similar problem spaces, that would amuse me 
Jim Losi said,
Wrote on June 17, 2006 @ 4:33 pm
I don’t think it’s a big stretch to wonder about this. I have a little inside hint to this actually but I can’t tell you more..though I wish I could because it’s just freaking awesome^10. I should be ok in saying that is has to do with .NET and AJAX though it has nothing to do with ATLAS.
ben said,
Wrote on June 17, 2006 @ 7:46 pm
really? Ajax, but NOT Atlas? interesting
I look forward to more details
Steve said,
Wrote on June 17, 2006 @ 7:52 pm
You have my interest as well, .NET + AJAX + ADO.NET Entity Framework, can you give any more hints
The Entity Framework being offered is much more feature rich then Linq to SQL (DLINQ), and will provide a lot more in terms of modelling entities. While Linq to SQL is more or less a 1-1 mapping between tables and objects the EF doesn’t have any such constraints. I’d love to see DLINQ go away (or be merged in with EF) so that we don’t end up with more then one O/R Mapping solution from Microsoft.
ben said,
Wrote on June 17, 2006 @ 8:28 pm
Steve, I assumed your thoughts about multiple O/R solutions based on your previous post about the overabundance of O/R tools. I was thinking about implementing my own O/R mapper as an academic exercise, and using DLINQ would really make it easier, so I can see how an Entity framework from MS might use DLINQ under the covers for persistance.
I would love to see them implement a clean solution for inserting and updating composite entites with fields from more than one table while at the same time abstracting the schema of the database altogether, without having to fumble around with primary and foreign keys from the (consumer) developers point of view.
Jim Losi said,
Wrote on June 18, 2006 @ 10:26 am
I can say that the next version of MSN Adcenter will be using it and that learning it will be less of a curve than ATLAS. This is all depending, ofcourse, on if they release it to the public and I hope they do.