There are a couple of data providers to interface with MySQL databases from .NET Apps. Which in your experience have you found the easiest to work with and most reliable?
I've never done this before so I want to walk down a path that's tried and tested.
MySQL Connector/NET works very well, it supports advanced stuff like Entity Framework, it's very actively developed and the support is good. It's very reliable mature software. The only thing you should be careful with is that sometimes they like to introduce breaking changes.
And it's open source!
You can use System.Data.Odbc connections and connection string as it:
DRIVER={MySql ODBC 3.51 Driver}; SERVER=localhost; DATABASE=***; DATASOURCE=***; UID=***;PASSWORD=***