Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011. Generic method to get entity by ID - dynamics-crm-2011

Question

In CRM 4.0 I had the generic method in my repository:
public T GetEntityById(Guid id)
{
var entities =
from e in m_context.GetEntities(typeof (T).Name)
where e.GetPropertyValue<Guid>(IdentityFieldName) == id
select e;
return (T) entities.FirstOrDefault();
}
But what about CRM 2011? ICrmEntity with GetPropertyValue method is missed...
What is alternate to get generic entity by ID?

Answer 1

something like (T) m_context.Retrieve(typeof (T).Name, id, new ColumnSet()).
See here

Answer 2

Found this question when looking for the same answer, this is how I ended up solving it.
public T GetEntityByID<T>(Guid guid) where T : Entity
{
return (T) (_organizationService.Retrieve((typeof(T)).Name, guid, new ColumnSet()));
}

Answer 3

You really want to be using the ToEntity method, rather than casting. Sometimes the typeof(T).Name will have capitalization differences, so I wrote a helper funciton as well:
/// <summary>
/// Retrieves the Entity of the given type with the given Id, with the given columns
/// </summary>
/// <typeparam name="T">An early bound Entity Type</typeparam>
/// <param name="service">open IOrganizationService</param>
/// <param name="id">Primary Key of Entity</param>
/// <param name="columnSet">Columns to retrieve</param>
/// <returns></returns>
public static T GetEntity<T>(this IOrganizationService service, Guid id, ColumnSet columnSet)
where T : Entity
{
return service.Retrieve(EntityHelper.GetEntityLogicalName<T>(), id, columnSet).ToEntity<T>()
}
public static string GetEntityLogicalName<T>() where T : Entity
{
return GetEntityLogicalName(typeof(T));
}
public static string GetEntityLogicalName(Type type)
{
var field = type.GetField("EntityLogicalName");
if (field == null)
{
if (type == typeof(Entity))
{
return "entity";
}
else
{
throw new Exception("Type " + type.FullName + " does not contain an EntityLogicalName Field");
}
}
return (string)field.GetValue(null);
}