Question

How to pass an Excel file from a WinForms client to a WCF service and into an SQL Server table?

Can anyone provide any guidance, code, or advice?

1. WCF service contract and implementation that will take an Excel file as a parameter
2. Contract implementation should insert that Excel file into a varbinary(MAX) column in SQL Server.

Answer 1

I’m sure the experts out there can improve upon this, but here are the basics …

On the Server

1a. Add a new OperationContract to your Interface (eg. IService.cs)

[OperationContract]
string UploadBinaryFile(byte[] aByteArray);

1b. Insert into SQL Server table, in your contract Implementation (eg. Service.cs)

public string UploadBinaryFile(byte[] aByteArray)
{
    try
    {
        SqlConnection conn = new SqlConnection();
        conn.ConnectionString = MyConnectionString; // from saved connection string
        conn.Open();
        using (SqlCommand cmd = new SqlCommand("INSERT INTO MyTestTable(BinaryFile) VALUES (@binaryfile)", conn))
        {
            cmd.Parameters.Add("@binaryfile", SqlDbType.VarBinary, -1).Value = aByteArray;
            cmd.ExecuteNonQuery();
        }

        return "1"; // to me, this indicates success
    }
    catch (Exception ex)
    {
        return "0: " + ex.Message; // return an error indicator + ex.message
    }
}

On the Client

2a. Use the OpenFileDialog component to browse for files on your filesystem using the standard dialogue box that’s used by most Windows applications.

if (openFileDialog1.ShowDialog() == DialogResult.OK)
{
    txtUploadFilePath.Text = openFileDialog1.FileName;
}

2b. Load the file’s contents into a byte array

var byte[] BinaryFile = System.IO.File.ReadAllBytes(txtUploadFilePath.Text);

2c. Call your WCF contract, passing in the byte array

string UploadResponse = client.UploadBinaryFile(BinaryFile);

It’s working… YAY 🙂