VS 2005 and SQLExpress

Having previously used VS.NET 2000 and 2003, I have just installed VS 2005, Professional Edition and with it, so I am told, SQLExpress.

I have a previous version of SQLServer installed on my machine (2000, Personal Edition, I believe) and that may have interfered with the new installation, because I cannot find any entry for SQLExpress" itself in "All Programs" - under "Microsoft SQL Server 2005" there are only three items, all classified as "Configuration Tools". So the only way I appear to be able to start or stop SQLExpress is by changing its status in "SQL Server Configuration Manager". Is that the intended was of interacting with it? Although it tells me there that it is running, there is no icon for it sitting in my Systems Tray.

In VS 2005 I selected as my initial profile "Web Application Developer (I write predominantly in VB) and hoping to gain familiarity with the facilities in the new version, attempted to acquire and run "A Personal Web Page" from "Getting Started".

I was told I should first run it (ctrl-F5) to establish an administrator, but when I tried this it failed on a timed-out error message in MSIE. This error report offered the choice of four different reasons for the attempt failing as follows:

"SQLExpress database file auto-creation error:

The connection string specifies a local Sql Server Express instance using a database location within the applications App_Data directory. The provider attempted to automatically create the application services database because the provider determined that the database does not exist. The following configuration requirements are necessary to successfully check for existence of the application services database and automatically create the application services database:

1. If the applications App_Data directory does not already exist, the web server account must have read and write access to the applications directory. This is necessary because the web server account will automatically create the App_Data directory if it does not already exist.

2. If the applications App_Data directory already exists, the web server account only requires read and write access to the applications App_Data directory. This is necessary because the web server account will attempt to verify that the Sql Server Express database already exists within the applications App_Data directory. Revoking read access on the App_Data directory from the web server account will prevent the provider from correctly determining if the Sql Server Express database already exists. This will cause an error when the provider attempts to create a duplicate of an already existing database. Write access is required because the web server accounts credentials are used when creating the new database.

3. Sql Server Express must be installed on the machine.

4. The process identity for the web server account must have a local user profile. See the readme document for details on how to create a local user profile for both machine and domain accounts."

That last sentence in 4. above I find to be truly astounding. What readme document is it talking about? Where am I supposed to find it?

As an independent self-employed developer, I need to come to terms with this as quickly as possible.

Can somebody explain to me what I need to do to get "A Personal Web Page" to talk to SQLExpress? Which of the 4 offered reasons is likely to be the cause of my failure, and precisely how do I get round it?

Hey,

It's saying that one problem could be that it can't find a SQL Server express database in the app_data folder of your web application, is that true? Or, the web app needs permissions to this folder (read/write), or I think the last one might mean that the ASPNET account or the worker account need to have a local user profile; it might mean the OS documentation, stating that security rights are needed on the computer...

My most grateful thanks for that, Brian.

The required database files certainly seem to be there. In the app_data folder there are a couple of .mdf files (ASPNETDB_TMP.mdf and Personal.mdf), with a .ldf file for the first of these, and a couple of .sql files - personal-add.sql and personal-remove.sql.

The other options you suggest are trickier, since I'm not totally conversant with SQLServer (I'm primarily an Access man myself), and I don't have the foggiest idea how to check them out. I would have thought - apparently I'm being over naive in this <g> - that necessary permissions and such like would have been set up automatically as part of the download and installation procedure (after all the example is in "Getting Started") or that an accompanying text file would have spelled out for me the steps I needed to go through before it could be run properly. But no "Idiot's Guide" seems to be there.

Could you or somebody else possibly walk me through what I need to do to check on and set up if needed the necessary permissions and profiles?

Hey,

LDF files are log files in SQL Server. Right-click the database, under security, do you see <machine name>\aspnet account?