Publishing a SQLExpress Database from Visual Studio

Question

I have tables in a local database I've built in Visual Studio 2008 that I want to publish to an existing database on the server that I will be deploying my Asp.NET app. Unfortunately the only two options I have for deploying this database when I select "publish" is -script to file- and -publish to shared hosting provider-. My dedicated DB server is neither.

Can someone help point me in the right direction?

Answer 1

Put your database in the App_Data folder (this is a common approach with SQL Express) and then when you publish there should be an option for including files in the App_Data folder. Once your site goes live, you would definitely NOT want to select this option :)

Also, here is a Microsoft article about using SQL Express with ASP.NET: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms247257.aspx