Originally Posted by BluePaper

Through using Visual Studio to learn more about ASP.net and VB.net I would like to connect to a database. I create an .mdf database file but I've no idea how to connect to it (well, I have some code below...) that's not my only problem but I'll ask the next question in a moment. The code I'm using is shown below, am I missing something? Or using the wrong connection string?

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Private Function sqlDBConnection() As Boolean
        'Set the variables
        Dim SQLConnectionString As String
        Dim SQLConnection As New SqlConnection()
        'Create the Connection String
        SQLConnectionString = "Data Source=.\SQLEXPRESS;AttachDbFilename=\App_Data\Overland.mdf;Initial Catalog=Overland;Integrated Security=True;User Instance=True"
        'Set the connection string into the SQL connection
        SQLConnection.ConnectionString = SQLConnectionString
        'Open up the connection
        SQLConnection.Open()
End Function
 

Private Function sqlDBConnection() As Boolean 'Set the variables Dim SQLConnectionString As String Dim SQLConnection As New SqlConnection() 'Create the Connection String SQLConnectionString = "Data Source=.\SQLEXPRESS;AttachDbFilename=\App_Data\Overland.mdf;Initial Catalog=Overland;Integrated Security=True;User Instance=True" 'Set the connection string into the SQL connection SQLConnection.ConnectionString = SQLConnectionString 'Open up the connection SQLConnection.Open() End Function

A similar connection string works ( "Data Source=LAMBDA\SQLEXPRESS;Initial Catalog=General;Integrated Security=True") with an actual database server (SQL Express 2005) but modifying it a bit doesn't work for an SQL Server file (.mdf in this case) so if you have any idea please help

Secondly as you can see I've got the function set as a Boolean, however I don't return anything and the .Open() function doesn't return anything. Therefore how can I check to see whether a connection is succesful or not before it breaks out into an error? I'd like to be able to catch it just incase.

Thanks for your time.