c# - How do I connect to an .mdf (Microsoft SQL Server Database File) in a simple web project?

Question

Specifically, in VS 2008, I want to connect to a data source that you can have by right-clicking on the automatically-generated App_Data folder (an .mdf "database"). Seems easy, and it is once you know how.

Answer 1

A great resource I always keep around is connectionstrings.com. It's really handy for finding these connection strings when you can't find an example.

Particularly this page applied to your problem

Attach a database file on connect to a local SQL Server Express instance

Driver={SQL Native Client};Server=.SQLExpress;AttachDbFilename=c:asdqwemydbfile.mdf; Database=dbname;Trusted_Connection=Yes;