Question

I am trying to set up a synchronization routine in C# to send data from a ms access database to a sql server. MS Access is not my choice it’s just the way it is.

I am able to query the MS Access database and get OleDbDataReader record set. I could potentially read each individual record and insert it onto SQL Server but it seems so wasteful.

Is there a better way to do this. I know I could do it in MS Access linking to sql server and perform the update easy but this is for end users and I don’t want them messing with access.

EDIT:
Just looking at SqlBulkCopy I think that may be the answer if I get my results into DataRow[]

Answer 1

I found a solution in .NET that I am very happy with. It allows me to give the access to the sync routine to any user within my program. It involves the SQLBulkCopy class.

private static void BulkCopyAccessToSQLServer
        (CommandType commandType, string sql, string destinationTable)
    {
        using (DataTable dt = new DataTable())
        {
            using (OleDbConnection conn = new OleDbConnection(Settings.Default.CurriculumConnectionString))
            using (OleDbCommand cmd = new OleDbCommand(sql, conn))
            using (OleDbDataAdapter adapter = new OleDbDataAdapter(cmd))
            {
                cmd.CommandType = commandType;
                cmd.Connection.Open();
                adapter.SelectCommand.CommandTimeout = 240;
                adapter.Fill(dt);
                adapter.Dispose();
            }

            using (SqlConnection conn2 = new SqlConnection(Settings.Default.qlsdat_extensionsConnectionString))
            {
                conn2.Open();
                using (SqlBulkCopy copy = new SqlBulkCopy(conn2))
                {
                    copy.DestinationTableName = destinationTable;
                    copy.BatchSize = 1000;
                    copy.BulkCopyTimeout = 240;
                    copy.WriteToServer(dt);
                    copy.NotifyAfter = 1000;
                }
            }
        }
    }

Basically this puts the data from MS Access into a DataTable it then uses the second connection conn2 and the SqlBulkCopy class to send the data from this DataTable to the SQL Server. It’s probably not the best code but should give anyone reading this the idea.