Difference between Transaction Scope and manually defined transactions ?

Question

Hi just reading about using transaction scrope, previously I am used to making transactions inside a single DB class like

try
            {
                con.Open();
                tran = con.BeginTransaction();
                OleDbCommand myCommand1 = new OleDbCommand(query1, con);
                OleDbCommand myCommand2 = new OleDbCommand(query2, con);
                myCommand .Transaction = tran;
                // Save Master
                myCommand1.ExecuteNonQuery();

                // Save Childred
                myCommand2.ExecuteNonQuery();

                // Commit transaction 
                tran.Commit();

            }
catch (OleDbException ex)
                {
                    tran.Rollback();
                    lblError.Text = "An error occured " + ex.ToString();
                }

                finally
                {
                    if (con != null)
                    {
                        con.Close();
                    }

                }

But now I come to know that I can execute transaction inside the Business Logic layer simply by using a transaction scope object and using separate DB classes like

   public static int Save(Employee myEmployee)
    {
      using (TransactionScope myTransactionScope = new TransactionScope())
      {
        int RecordId = EmpDB.Save(myEmployee);

        foreach (Address myAddress in myEmployee.Addresses)
        {
          myAddress.EmployeeId = EmployeeId;
          AddressDB.Save(myAddress);
        }

        foreach (PhoneNumber myPhoneNumber in myEmployee.PhoneNumbers)
        {
          myPhoneNumber.EmployeeId = EmployeeId;
          PhoneNumberDB.Save(myPhoneNumber);
        }

        myTransactionScope.Complete();

        return EmployeeId;
      }
    }

Which one is the recommended coding practice and why ? Is using a Transaction Scope safe ? Is it the latest way to do things ? I am confused about both methods.

Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

One of the nice things about Transaction scope is that you don't need the try/catch block. You just have to call Complete on the scope in order to commit the transaction, and it rollsback automatically if an exception does occur.

You can also use other components that are able to participate in transactions, not just the DB connection. This is because the components (including the connection) look for a Transaction on the current thread. It is this transaction that is created by the call to

using (TransactionScope myTransactionScope = new TransactionScope())