11

I'm currently working on some evaluation work for a project that I'm planning.

I recently looked at solutions for a data storage mechanism for my application and while researching stumbled upon SQLite. I currently use SQLite with the System.Data.SQLite wrapper.

I really like the way it works but I have one problem with it that I couldn't get fixed and I also found no help concerning my problem on the internet.

I would like my SQLite Database to be embedded into one of my applications DLLs (ie. Title.Storage.dll) to be used within this DLL. Is this possible?

How can I access the database then?

It would be great if I could use something like:

SQLiteConnection con = new SQLiteConnection();
con.ConnectionString="DataSource=Title.Storage.storage.db3";
con.Open();

Thanks in advance and best regards,

3Fox

9
  • 3
    This can't possibly be possible. How would you write to the database? You'd have to open the assembly for writing. Not answering because I can't provide technical details. Commented Apr 26, 2009 at 17:10
  • 1
    Even if this was possible, I'd imagine it would send some security suites crazy - large, constant changes to a code file. Commented Apr 26, 2009 at 17:29
  • 3
    If you had a small amount of read-only data that you wished to query, this would probably work just fine - read the resource into an in-memory database and query it. Commented Apr 26, 2009 at 17:40
  • I might be mistake, but I remmember when dealing with Dotnet 2 there was a way to embed a sql express DB into the exe/dll Commented Apr 26, 2009 at 17:58
  • @Will - We don't want to write to the database - we want to use it as a starting point for a :memory: hosted database which isn't necessarily retained anywhere. The "solutions" that extract the embedded resource to a file first aren't ideal - really limits the utility of in-memory databases. Commented May 8, 2013 at 15:27

5 Answers 5

16

An assembly isn't for file storage, it's for code storage. While you can store files in an assembly, they are read only.

Sign up to request clarification or add additional context in comments.

Comments

3

This is not possible as such. What you could do is embed the db in your dll project and dump it to certain location on the file system (may be AppData?) and read and write from there. Having db sit directly inside the executable (or dlls) may not be a good idea in the sense it bloats the size of the application besides being technically infeasible.

Having a single executable to distribute is a matter of taste which I like. In your case but the problems are more. It's not just about embedding the db file alone, what about the dlls associated with it? Steps are 2:

1) Add the necessary dlls (System.Data.SQLite?) associated with your db to your project as Embedded Resource (not necessarily a Resource file) and let the system automatically resolve the assembly conflicts. Catch it here how to do it.

2) Now either add your db file to your Resources of your project (and extract it)

static void DumpDatabase()
{
    var dbFullPath = Utility.GetDbFullPath(); //your path
    if (File.Exists(dbFullPath))
        return; //whatever your logic is

    File.WriteAllBytes(dbFullPath, Properties.Resources.myDb);
}

or even better do not embed the db as such in your project but write the logic to create database in your application. What if tomorrow you need to change the version of SQLite, say from 3 to 4? With the first approach you need to create a database for yourself and re-embed it in the project. But if you are writing the logic to create the db in your application then updating SQLite version is just a matter of changing the ADO.NET dll (the code remains the same). May be like this:

static void DumpDatabase()
{
    var dbFullPath = Utility.GetDbFullPath();
    if (File.Exists(dbFullPath))
        return; //whatever your logic is

    CreateDb(dbFullPath);
}

static void Create(string dbFullPath)
{
    SQLiteConnection.CreateFile(dbFullPath);

    string query = @"

    CREATE TABLE [haha] (.............)
    CREATE TABLE ..............";

    Execute(query);
}

And in the connection string add FailIfMissing=False;

Comments

0

If you're on NTFS, you can use an alternate data stream. On my project we hide the SQLite database inside another file using an alternate stream called :DB.

2 Comments

what happens if I copy the file to a FAT32 partition and back?
You will lose alternative stream after copying the file to FAT partition.
0

I don't think storing data in DLL is a good idea, but there is a dirty way to do it.

To load data from DLL:

  1. Use System.Reflection.Assembly to load a string from DLL file. (The string is dump of DB)
  2. Create empty SQLite DB in memory.
  3. Use the loaded string as a query to DB to restore its content.

Now you can make any queries in memory.

To save data to DLL:

  1. Dump DB content into a string.
  2. Create temporary file containing SQL-dump wrapped in C# code.
  3. Compile it using "csc" (or "gmcs" in Mono).

It's stupid, but it should work. Hope you will never code that way.

Comments

-3

SQLite is packaged and distributed as a single C file with a few (3 I think) header files. This means that you can compile the entire 50000 line program with one compile command and get a .o file. From there, you can link it into your application DLL with the other files you link into that DLL.

Once you build sqlite3.o into your application DLL, the symbols in its SQLite's API become available to your programs in the same way that your other C/C++ DLLs become available to your C#/VB programs.

Check out www.sqlite.org/amalgamation.html for more info.

1 Comment

That was totally not what I was trying to achieve. I wanted to embed the <u>database</u> file in a dll not the dll that allows me to access it.

Your Answer

By clicking “Post Your Answer”, you agree to our terms of service and acknowledge you have read our privacy policy.

Start asking to get answers

Find the answer to your question by asking.

Ask question

Explore related questions

See similar questions with these tags.