Question

If i have a dll which i use in many web applications to use methods in this dll in my applications.

What ‘s the best practice to handle the connection string ?

The dll methods are static methods ..

this is what i do

 private static String connectionString = "User Id=xxx;Password=xxx;Host=xxx;Server=xxx;Service=1525;Database=xxx; Client Locale=ar_ae.1256; Database Locale=ar_ae.8859-6; Protocol=olsoctcp;pooling=true;Min Pool Size=4;Max Pool Size=400;Connection Timeout=30";

---

public static int Is_Valid_User(string p_u, string p_p)
        {
            int ret = 0;  // invalid user
            using (IfxConnection conn = new IfxConnection(connectionString))
            {
                IfxCommand DBCmd = new IfxCommand();
                String p = My_Decryption_2(p_p);
                try
                {
                    if (conn.State == ConnectionState.Closed)
                        conn.Open();
                    DBCmd = new IfxCommand();
                    DBCmd.Connection = conn;
                    DBCmd.CommandText = "SELECT nvl(emp_num,0) FROM emp_net WHERE username = ? AND DECRYPT_CHAR(password, 'xxxxxx') = ? ";
                    DBCmd.Parameters.Add("user_name", p_u);
                    DBCmd.Parameters.Add("password", p);
                    using (IfxDataReader dataReader = DBCmd.ExecuteReader())
                    {
                        if (dataReader.Read())
                            ret = (int)dataReader[0];
                        dataReader.Close();
                    }
                }
                catch (ApplicationException e)
                {

                }
                conn.Close();
            }
            return ret;
        }

---

Is this a good way to use a dll in my web application ?or there ‘s a way better than this ?

Answer 1

You have pretty much shot yourself in the foot with those static methods.
Best practise is probably to refactor the class to use instance methods and inject the connection string through the constructor or properties.

Failing that you can refactor the static methods to include the connection string?

public static int Is_Valid_User(string p_u, string p_p, string connectionString)

You can hard code a reference to the [web|app]config connection string too, but that has only changed the problem (the dependency on a fixed string), not solved it.