Introduction to ADO.

NET

Introduction

This is a set of questions and answers related to ADO.NET. The questions by no

means cover the entire capabilities of ADO.NET.

 What is ADO.NET?
 Is ADO.NET different than ADO?
 What are managed providers?
 What are the data access namespaces in .NET?
 What are main objects in ADO.NET?
 How do I establish connection with a database?
 How do I use Command object to execute action queries?
 How do I use command object to execute Select queries?
 How do I use command object to execute stored procedure?
 What is DataAdapter and Dataset?
 How do i populate a dataset?
 How do I navigate dataset?
 How do I add new record?
 How do I change data ?
 How do I delete a row?
 How do I filter data once arrived in data set?
 How do I handle errors ?
 How do I handle transactions?

What is ADO.NET?

ADO.NET is next generation of data access technology from Microsoft. ADO.NET is

built with distributed and internet applications in mind. ADO.NET provides strong
support for XML and disconnected data processing.

Is ADO.NET different than ADO?

ADO.NET is much different than ADO. In order to achieve disconnected data access
programmers have to use different techniques like disconnected recordsets, RDS etc.
ADO object model is very small as compared to ADO.NET. ADO.NET provides number
of specialized objects to handle very specific tasks. Microsoft has taken care to
closely map properties and methods of ADO.NET objects with existing ADO
counterparts. As per Microsoft ADO.NET is not a replacement for ADO but an
enhancement in the overall data access technology. You can use both ADO and
ADO.NET in your application.

What are managed providers?

A managed provider is analogous to ODBC driver or OLEDB provider. It performs

operation of communicating with the database. ADO.NET currently provides two
distinct managed providers. The SQL Server managed provider is used with SQL

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server and is a very efficient way of communicating with SQL Server. OLEDB
managed provider is used to communicate with any OLEDB compliant database like
Access or Oracle. The data access APIs for both the providers are found in separate
namespaces.

What are the data access namespaces in .NET?

Following are the most common data access namespaces :

 System.Data
 System.Data.OleDb
 System.Data.SQLClient
 System.Data.SQLTypes
 System.Data.XML

What are main objects in ADO.NET?

Following are the main objects in ADO.NET :

 OleDbConnection / SQLConnection
 OleDbCommand / SQLCommand
 OleDbDataReader / SQLDataReader
 OleDbDataAdapter / SQLDataAdapter
 OleDbParameter / SQLParameter
 DataSet
 DataTable
 DataView
 DataRow
 DataColumn

Most of the objects mentioned above can be created as 'stand-alone' objects via
code. In the discussion below we will see all the examples with OLEDB objects. The
usage for SQL server objects is same except name changes. Also, for simplicity I
have omitted the repetitive code (like opening a database connection) in later
examples.

How do I establish connection with a database?

The way you connect to a database is very similar to that used in ADO. You use
connection object to accomplish this. Consider following code fragment :

Dim cnn as OleDbConnection

cnn=new OleDbConnection("OLEDB_connection_string")

cnn.open()

'use connection
here

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cnn.close()

How do I use Command object to execute action queries?

Using command object is similar to that from ADO.

Dim cmd as OleDbCommand

Dim cnn as
OleDbConnection
cnn=new OleDbConnection("OLEDB_connection_string")

cnn.open()

cmd=

newOleDbCommand("my_action_query",cnn)

cmd.ExecuteNonQuery()
cmd.CommandText=
"new_query"

How do I use command object to execute Select queries?

You can collect records returned by a command object using DataReader object.

Dim dr as OleDbDataReader
Dim cmd as OleDbCommand
Dim cnn as OleDbConnection
cnn=new OleDbConnection("OLEDB_connection_string")

cnn.open()

cmd=new OleDbCommand("my_select_query",cnn)

dr=cmd.ExecuteReader()

do while dr.read()

response.write(dr("field1"))

loop

dr.close()

How do I use command object to execute stored procedure?

You can execute a stored procedure in the same way as any query. Following
example shows how to execute parameterize stored procedure.

Dim cmd as OleDbCommand

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Dim p as OleDbParameter
Dim cmd as OleDbCommand
Dim cnn as OleDbConnection
cnn=new OleDbConnection("OLEDB_connection_string")

cnn.open()

cmd=new OleDbCommand("my_stproc_name",cnn)

p=new OleDbParameter("name",type,width)

p.value="myvalue"
cmd.parameters.Add(p)
'add all the parameters in the same way

cmd.ExecuteNonQuery()

What is DataAdapter and Dataset?

Dataset is an in-memory disconnected representation of data from actual database.

Dataset can be thought of as a collection of recordsets. Each such recordset is called
as a DataTable. Note that data table can be based on JOIN queries. Dataset is much
more powerful than a simple collection of DataTables. You can also put relations
and constraints within various datatables of a dataset. DataSet and its constituent
parts like DataTable, DataRow can also be created programmatically.

Since dataset is totally disconnected from the database there must be some means
of communication between the dataset and the database. DataAdapter is used for
that purpose. The main functions performed by DataAdapter are :

 Populate the dataset by fetching data from database

 Updating changes made to the dataset back to the database

Changes made to the dataset are not written to the database unless explicitly
updated via DataAdapter.

How do i populate a dataset?

To populate a dataset you will use DataAdapter's Fill method. One DataAdapter can
be used to populate several tables of one or many datasets.

Dim dscmd as OleDbDataAdapter

Dim ds as Dataset
dscmd=new OleDbDataAdapter("sql_select_statement",cnn)

ds=new DataSet()
dscmd.Fill(ds,"data_table_name")

How do I navigate a dataset?

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Dim row as DataRow
For each row in ds.Tables("data_table_name").Rows

row.Columns("field1").toString()

Next

How do I add new record to a dataTable?

Dim row as DataRow

row=ds.Tables("recordset_name_in_ds").NewRow()

row("field1")="value1"

row("field1")="value1"

.
ds.Tables("recordset_name_in_ds").Rows.Add(row)

dscmd.Update(ds,"data_table_name")

Here,note that you are issuing update on data adapter rather than dataset itself
because dataset is actually a disconnected view of data and you must have valid
connection information to update changes to original database.

How do I change data from a DataTable?

Dim row as DataRow

'i can be any number in below statement
row= ds.Tables("data_table_name").Rows(i)

row("field1")="value1"

row("field1")="value1"

dscmd.update(ds,"data_table_name")

How do I delete a row from a DataTable?

ds.Tables("data_table_name").Rows(i).Delete

dscmd.update(ds,"data_table_name")

How do I filter data once arrived in dataTable?

You can filter data based on some conditions using datatables object's Select
method.

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Dim rows() as DataRow
rows=ds.Tables(0).Select("condition_similar_to_where_clause")

How do I handle errors ?

There can be various ways in which you can handle errors. Using try..catch is most
common. ADO.NET also provides a mechanism by which you can set row level error
messages.

Dim cnn as OleDbConnection

Dim cmd as OleDbDataAdapter
Dim ds as Dataset
Dim errors as DataRow()
cnn=new OleDbConnection("connection_string")
cnn.open()
ds=new dataset()
cmd= new
OleDbDataAdapter("select_query",cnn)
cmd.Fill(ds,"data_table_name")

ds.Tables("data_table_name").Rows(0).RowError =
"Some error msg"

ds.Tables("data_table_name").Rows(1).RowError = "Some
other error msg"

if ds.tables("users").HasErrors then
errors = ds.tables("data_table_name").GetErrors()
' do something with erroraneous rows
end if

In above code you can set row level error messages depending on certain business
validation. This will allow us to use common error handling routines.Also, note that
the RowError property is also set by ADO.NET if there is any real database error.

How do I handle transactions?

ADO.NET offers OleDbTransaction object to control a transaction. This object is

returned by BeginTransaction method of OleDbConnection.

Dim tran as OleDbTransaction

Dim cnn as OleDbConnection
cnn=new OleDbConnection("connection_string")
try

cnn.open()
tran=
cnn.BeginTransaction()
cmd=new OleDbCommand("some_sql",cnn)

cmd.Transaction=

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 tran
cmd.ExecuteNonQuery()

cmd.commandtext=
"some_other_sql"
cmd.ExecuteNonQuery()

tran.Commit()

catch myException as Exception

tran.Rollback()

end try