ADO.NET Cookbook

1.19. Connecting to a Text File

Problem

You want to use ADO.NET to access data stored in a text file.

Solution

Use the OLE DB Jet provider to access data in a text file.

The sample code creates an OleDbDataAdapter that uses the Jet OLE DB provider to load the contents of the text file Categories.txt, shown in Example 1-13, into a DataTable and displays the contents in a data grid on the form.

Example 1-13. File: Categories.txt

"CategoryID","CategoryName","Description"
1,"Beverages","Soft drinks, coffees, teas, beers, and ales"
2,"Condiments","Sweet and savory sauces, relishes, spreads, and seasonings"
3,"Confections","Desserts, candies, and sweet breads"
4,"Dairy Products","Cheeses"
5,"Grains/Cereals","Breads, crackers, pasta, and cereal"
6,"Meat/Poultry","Prepared meats"
7,"Produce","Dried fruit and bean curd"
8,"Seafood","Seaweed and fish"

The C# code is shown in Example 1-14.

Example 1-14. File: ConnectTextFileForm.cs

// Namespaces, variables, and constants
using System;
using System.Configuration;
using System.Windows.Forms;
using System.Data;
using System.Data.OleDb;

//  . . . 

// Create the data adapter to retrieve all rows from text file.
OleDbDataAdapter da =
    new OleDbDataAdapter("SELECT * FROM [Categories.txt]",
    ConfigurationSettings.AppSettings["TextFile_0119_ConnectString"]);

// Create and fill the table.
DataTable dt = new DataTable("Categories");
da.Fill(dt);

// Bind the default view of the table to the grid.
categoriesDataGrid.DataSource = dt.DefaultView;

Discussion

The Jet ...