Develop a data centric, multi-user windows application using Visual Studio 2010

So, after tinkering with programming for about 3 months now, I find myself in a situation where I'd like to try to develop a database windows application that can be used by a few users on my office network.

What I'm trying to do is create a simple property database for my small company that can be accessed by the half of a dozen co-workers.

The issue I'm coming to head with, is that I'm not really sure if I'm creating my windows application the correct way in order to share a single database on a server on our network. I have created, what I believe to be, a single user application with an express 2008 DB. However, I am not sure if I can take this program and migrate it to a multi-user program.

I've been trying to search for a quick guide with maybe some hints and tips of how to initially setup the project to correctly deploy the project as a multi-user application. However, I've been unable to find anything of relevance.

I really have no problem re-creating the project from start to finish, as it's good practice and I'm sure I have inefficient code in many plac开发者_运维百科es. I just need somewhere to start.

All of our machines are using WinXP and I'm pretty sure we have SBS 08.

Noob appreciation would be granted to those who help and thanks for your time.

Edit: I'm using Linq-to-Entities, if that means anything.

most likely you will have a local DB with your application. To make it a multi-Client one, you need to host the DB at a central place. Now you need to supply all clients with the correct connection string to access your DB.

Check the syntax for the connection string here: http://www.connectionstrings.com/

If you did everything right, that should be it (well... Excluding blocking issues, concurrency, update methods and validation ect... Who will win if 2 guys work on the same record...)

But those questions would require a whole new chapter ;)

The way to do is keep your application the way it is and put the database in a central place.

Then set the connection string correctly to point the app to the central database.

Like this: Suppose you have installed sql server on a machine named mypc then the connection string will be like: "data source = mypc ; initial catalog = mydb ; integrated security = true" what that means is,

The database named mydb resides on a server called mypc. So that your app can access it. You do not need to worry about anything else. SQL server will handle other things for you. Also you can use sql express for this too. Just modyfy the conn string to "data source = mypc\sqlexpress ; initial catalog = mydb ; integrated security = true"

If your application Requirement is multi user and within a single office (Same place) with having LAN Connection then the you can go for the windows application and the same application deployee on the multiple system in the office and set the single database for the all application so that you can use the application on multiple machines with a single database.

In this way you dont need any changes in your application just you need to modify a single line of code in the app.config if u wish to change the application.