the thing is happen two year ago, Linq to SQL Dead, Ever since the release of the Entity Framework and the Linq to SQL team's move to the ADO.net team we have bean hearing about Linq to SQL being dead. The ADO.NET team(which owns the EF as well) release the roadmap where they said:
" we're making significant investments in the Entity Framework such that as of .Net 4.0 the Entity Framework will be out recommended data access solution for LINQ to relational scenarios. we are listening to customers regarding LINQ to SQL and will continue to product based on feedback we receive from the community as well."
this caused an uproar as you might imageine. so a few days later Tim Mallalieu, PM of the Linq to SQL and Linq to EF teams clarify by say this:
"we will continue make some investments in LINQ to SQL based on customer feedback. this post was about making our intentions for future innovation clear and to call out the fact that as of .NET4.o, Linq to entites will be the recommended data access solution for linq to relation scenarios.. we also want to get your feedback on the key experiences in LINQ to SQL that we need to add in to LINQ to Entities in order to enable the same simple scenarios that brought you to use LINQ to SQL in the first place."
Sounds pretty dead to me. if you don't believe me, just talk to any fox pro developer, VB 6 developer, or any Access developer who loves the Jet engine. they are still "supported" as well. As this has shaken out over the past month or so, there are two camps:
I told you so! and No way man, it is part of the framework, it will be supported for 10 years!
Well they are both wrong.
I told you so scrowd is claiming victory, while linq to sql may be dead, linq to sql has a lot of traction in the developer commnunity. according to Data Direct Technologies's recent .Net Data Access Trends Survey of production .Net application use Linq to sql as their primary data access method. while this number is not huges, you can't ignore these developers voting with their feet by using Linq to sql in the applications.
Reference: http://www.stephenforte.net/PermaLink,guid,bc1bc043-3cdc-4ac2-8b46-3c72ad1d61cf.aspx