I have a database located on a web server and I need to be able to edit it using a vb.net desktop application. As far as I can see there are two ways to do this:

1) connect directly to the database somehow and reference it as if it were local or
2) using ftp, download the database, edit it offline and then upload the database again.

Unfortunately, I know how to achieve neither of these. I can achieve option 2 using vb6 and winsock but i am lost and confused with vb.net and the system.net.sockets namespace. Any assistance would be greatly appreciated.