CODEWITHSUNDEEP
sql-serverconnection-stringlocal
Ben Griswold
Ben Griswold

Reputation: 18331

Configure a SQL Server Instance as (local)

Each member of our development team has a copy of our application's database running on a local version of SQL Server 2008 Enterprise with SP1. Everyone is able to access the database by specifying their server and instance name in their web.config file, but to best share the developer version of our web.config file, we have standardized on making connections strings generic by using integrated security and setting server property to (local). This strategy is working fine for the majority of our 64-bit Windows 7 machines but in few cases (local) isn't recognized. We have compared settings via the SQL Server Configuration Manager (namely ensuring that the named pipes protocol was enabled) and we've tried setting the "(local)" alias via SQL Server Client Network Utility, but we haven't any luck. What needs to be done in order to use (local) in our connections strings?

Upvotes: 6

Views: 6228

Answers (2)

Geoff Maddox
Geoff Maddox

Reputation: 196

Trying changing the Pipe Name for your instance to "\.\pipe\sql\query".

You can find that setting by starting SQL Server Configuration Manager, and navigating to SQL Server Network Configuration > Protocols for (Instance Name) and right-clicking on Named Pipes and selecting Properties. If Named Pipes is not enabled, be sure to enable it before restarting the SQL Server service (see comment by @NoahHeldman).

When connecting to the default instance (that is, without an instance name), SQL Server uses the default port of 1433 and the default pipe name of "\.\pipe\sql\query". Changing it back to match should (hopefully) fix it.

Upvotes: 11

Shan Plourde
Shan Plourde

Reputation: 8726

Those machines where the database connection as (local) doesn't work is probably that way because during the database installation, the instance name was set to something specific, rather than the default of "default instance". You can change these instance names, which may resolve this issue: http://coderjournal.com/2008/02/how-to-change-instance-name-of-sql-server/.

I think this occurs when you have SQL Server Express already installed and running, and then install SQL Server Developer Edition / Standard / etc....not 100% sure though, but from what I recall, that may be the case.

Upvotes: 2

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