audit-trail

Automatic audit trails for EF Core entities are implemented by integrating the IAuditable interface with a SaveChanges interceptor. This setup auto-populates creation, modification, and soft-delete fields with UTC timestamps and user attribution across typical data access patterns.

Yes, you can convert hard deletes to soft deletes using an EF Core SaveChanges interceptor. The interceptor automatically intercepts delete operations and applies soft-delete tracking to your auditable entities instead of permanently removing them from the database.

EF Core audit tracking requires an IUserContext implementation to attribute changes to specific users. You must register this user context alongside the SaveChanges interceptor in your .NET DI container to populate the audit fields accurately.

Entity auditing with EF Core interceptors requires .NET 8 or higher. You also need the EF Core framework and proper interceptor registration within your dependency injection container to enforce UTC timestamps and automatic audit field population.

User context integration tracks entity modifications by passing the current user identity through an IUserContext implementation. The EF Core SaveChanges interceptor reads this context to automatically populate audit fields with the user who performed the creation, modification, or soft-delete action.

The best way to standardize audit fields across EF Core domain models is using an IAuditable interface or AuditableEntity base class. This ensures consistent audit metadata for creation, modification, and soft-delete events, which the interceptor automatically populates.