The store provider factory type Oracle.DataAccess.Client.OracleClientFactory does not implement the IServiceProvider interface

Trying to use the Oracle Data Provider for .NET (ODP.NET) with Entity Framework (EF) results in the following error:

System.Data.ProviderIncompatibleException:   The store provider factory type 'Oracle.DataAccess.Client.OracleClientFactory' does not implement the IServiceProvider interface. Use a store provider that implements this interface.

Possible Root Causes:

1.  If ODP.Net Entity Framework is used, make sure that the dll 'Oracle.DataAccess.dll'  in Visual Studio Solution explorer is pointing to version '2.112.3.0'. The reason is that the ODP.Net Entity Framework is supported only with version '112.3.0' or later.

 To know which version dll is loaded in Visual Studio, we can use a free tool called Process Explorer, this will help to analyze the dlls loaded on Visual Studio exe (Devenv.exe).

2. ODP.Net Entitiy framework support .Net 4.0 (or later) versions. I have created ODP.Net entities in Visual Studio 2010 and changed the framework to 3.5  (for SharePoint development reasons) that gave me the same error as above one when i ran the application, but when I change the framework to 4.0, it works fine.

Most of the blogs (I personally found in google search) doesn't speak clearly about this. So please make sure that you are using ODP.Net  Entity Frameworkwith only 4.0 or later version of .Net framework. However, please note that the ODP.Net  (without entity framework) supports the earlier .Net versions such as .Net 3.5 (this is what we tried).

 Sometimes, you may also see errors like "Could not load assembly Oracle.DataAccess.dll", this may be the issue with bit versions. Oracle provides this dll in two versions, they are: 32 bit and 64 bit. In visual studio you make sure that you are using 32 bit dll since Visual Studio 2010 is 32 bit. While deploying the ShareObjects (like webparts), make sure that you are using 64 bit Oracle.DataAccess.dll since SharePoint 2010 supports only 64 bit dlls

Could not load file or assembly Oracle.DataAccess in SharePoint 2010

In our SharePoint 2010 environment we started using ODP.Net to connect to Oracle Database. We have installed the 64 bit ODP.Net software and tried to build a webpart which gets the data from Oracle DB and display it in a Gird. But while loading the webpart page in SharePoint after deployment, we got the issue with Oracle.DataAccess.dll. The error was "Could not load file or assembly 'Oracle.DataAccess'". Finally we have found that we needed to use 64 bit version Oracle.DataAccess.dll. For some reason we also had 32 bit version Oracle Access dll on our machine, so we had to find the 64 bit dll and correctly reference it in Visual Stuio, butild it and deploy to SharePoint Web App. Provided the steps below:

1.    Developed a web part which shows the data on button click from Oracle Database using a Stored Procedure with ODP.Net framework

2.    Referenced 64 bit Oracle dll from GAC and added the reference in Visual Studio

2.1  Steps for finding 64 bit dll from GAC

2.1.1      Go to command Prompt and enter the command “cd c:\Windows\assembly”, hit enter

2.1.2      Enter Command “dir Oracle.dataaccess.dll /s”, hit enter, now the screen should show like below:

                      

The above screen shows the references of Oracle.DataAccess.dll in GAC and their physical paths. We need to 64 bit dll path for SharePoint App.

3.    Make the Oracle dll path to 64 bit folder in GAC with the help of above screen, like below:

c:\Windows\assembly\GAC_64\Oracle.DataAccess\2.112.1.0__89b483f429c47342\oracle.dataaccess.dll

4.    Add the 64bit Oracle dll to Visual Studio solution, like below:

4.1  Go to Visual Studio Solution Explorer and click on “Add Reference”

4.2  That opens a dialogue like below:

Enter the dll path (found in step 2.1.2) in the File Name text box and hit enter, that shows the oracle.Dataaccess.dll as shown in the above diagram. Select the dll and click Ok.

5.    Now build the application and deploy the solution to SharePoint Web App

6.    Make sure that Oralce.DataAccess.dll is registered under safecontrol properly, as shown below:

<SafeControl Assembly="Oracle.DataAccess, Version=2.112.1.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=89b483f429c47342" Namespace="Oracle.DataAccess" TypeName="*" Safe="True" SafeAgainstScript="False" />

This worked fine.