Dynamic Connection String

Question

Good Day,

I have two connection strings defined in my web.config file.

<connectionStrings>
    <add name="AppDb" connectionString="CONNECTION-STRING1"/>
    <add name="LaptopDb" connectionString="CONNECTION-STRING2" />
</connectionStrings>

When I am working on my desktop, I want to use the connection string "AppDb". When I am working on my laptop, I want to use the connection string "LaptopDb". I don't want to comment out the line on the connection string everytime I work on a different machine.

I know that I can programatically do this. I'm just trying to figure out the best way.

Something like:

if (machineName == desktop)
     use AppDb
else
     use LaptopDb

but I don't like this approach. Is there something else I can test on?

Community · Accepted Answer · 2020-06-20 09:12:55Z

1

Here's another couple of approaches you could consider:

You can use the configSource attribute to read the configuration for that element from another file, the contents of which can be different on each machine:

http://weblogs.asp.net/fmarguerie/archive/2007/04/26/using-configsource-to-split-configuration-files.aspx
Or you can use different build configurations and use XDT to transform the web.config file.

edited Jun 20, 2020 at 9:12

CommunityBot

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answered Feb 11, 2012 at 20:10

Mark Byers

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Comments

Wyatt Barnett · Accepted Answer · 2012-02-11 20:17:44Z

1

Really not too hard to do -- the trick is to use the System.Environment.MachineName to drive which string to pick and to get your connection string from a static property:

public static string ConnectionStringName
{
    get
    {
        var customConnection = ConfigurationManager.ConnectionStrings[Environment.MachineName] != null;
        var connectionStringName = customConnection ? Environment.MachineName : "DefaultDb";
        return connectionStringName;
    }
}

answered Feb 11, 2012 at 20:17

Wyatt Barnett

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