ADO.NET 3.5 Cookbook, 2nd Edition

1.10. Connecting to a Microsoft Access Database

Problem

You want to connect to a Microsoft Access database.

Solution

Use the OLE DB .NET data provider.

The solution creates and opens a connection to a Microsoft Access database using the OLE DB .NET data provider. Information about the connection is displayed.

The C# code in Program.cs in the project ConnectAccessDatabase is shown in Example 1-11.

Example 1-11. File: Program.cs for ConnectAccessDatabase solution

using System;
using System.Data;
using System.Data.OleDb;

namespace ConnectAccessDatabase
{
    class Program
    {
        static void Main(string[] args)
        {
            string oledbConnectString =
                "Provider=Microsoft.ACE.OLEDB.12.0;Data Source=" +
                @"C:\Documents and Settings\bill\My Documents\" +
                "Northwind 2007.accdb;";

            using (OleDbConnection connection =
                new OleDbConnection(oledbConnectString))
            {
                connection.Open(  );

                // Output some connection and database information.
                Console.WriteLine("Connection State: {0}", connection.State);
                Console.WriteLine("OLE DB Provider: {0}", connection.Provider);
                Console.WriteLine("Server Version: {0}", connection.ServerVersion);
            }

            Console.WriteLine("\nPress any key to continue.");
            Console.ReadKey(  );
        }
    }
}

The output is shown in Figure 1-10.

Figure 1-10. Output for ConnectAccessDatabase solution

Discussion

You can connect to a Microsoft Access database using the OLE DB .NET data provider. The OLE DB connection uses the Microsoft.ACE.OLEDB.12.0, ...