[RESOLVED] Create dynamic connection string

[jmcilhinney]

I just threw together a quick test and here's what the DbContext looks like:

'------------------------------------------------------------------------------
' <auto-generated>
'    This code was generated from a template.
'
'    Manual changes to this file may cause unexpected behavior in your application.
'    Manual changes to this file will be overwritten if the code is regenerated.
' </auto-generated>
'------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Imports System
Imports System.Data.Entity
Imports System.Data.Entity.Infrastructure

Partial Public Class Database1Entities
    Inherits DbContext

    Public Sub New()
        MyBase.New("name=Database1Entities")
    End Sub

    Protected Overrides Sub OnModelCreating(modelBuilder As DbModelBuilder)
        Throw New UnintentionalCodeFirstException()
    End Sub

    Public Property People() As DbSet(Of Person)

End Class

Note that there is only one constructor and it has no parameters, so that's the only way to create an instance. You can add a partial class and add a new constructor that takes a connection string as a parameter. That base constructor that the code above is calling accepts either the name of a connection string in the config file or an actual connection string. Your constructor can simply pass on the connection string it receives as an argument. E.g.

Partial Public Class Database1Entities

    Public Sub New(connectionString As String)
        MyBase.New(connectionString)
    End Sub

End Class

I'm not 100% sure but I believe that it will accept a full EF connection string or just a standard ADO.NET connection string. You can experiment a little to see what works.