SQL Bulk Copy Operations in ADO.NET 2.0

Bulk copying of data from one data source to another data source is a new feature added to ADO.NET 2.0. Bulk copy classes provides the fastest way to transfer set of data from once source to the other.

Each ADO.NET data provider provides bulk copy classes. For example, in SQL .NET data provider, the bulk copy operation is handled by SqlBulkCopy class. Data from a data source can be copied to one of the four types - DataReader, DataSet, DataTable, or XML.

Using bulk copy operation, you can transfer data between two tables on the same SQL Server, between two different SQL Servers, or even two different types of database servers.

Example:

SqlCommand cmd = new SqlCommand("DELETE FROM BulkDataTable", destination);
// Open source and destination connections.
source.Open();
destination.Open();
cmd.ExecuteNonQuery();
// Select data from Products table
cmd = new SqlCommand("SELECT * FROM Products", source);
// Execute reader
SqlDataReader reader = cmd.ExecuteReader();
// Create SqlBulkCopy
SqlBulkCopy bulkData = new SqlBulkCopy(destination);
// Set destination table name
bulkData.DestinationTableName = "BulkDataTable";
// Write data
bulkData.WriteToServer(reader);
// Close objects
bulkData.Close();
destination.Close();
source.Close();