.NET: How to insert XML document into SQL Server

Question

I want to insert arbitrary XML into SQL Server. The XML is contained in an XmlDocument object.

The column I want to insert into is either nvarchar

Answer 1

You have to use an SqlParameter. I would recommend doing it like that:

command.Parameters.Add(
   new SqlParameter("@xml", SqlDbType.Xml) 
       {Value = new SqlXml(new XmlTextReader(xmlToSave.InnerXml
                       , XmlNodeType.Document, null)) })

and the SQL should look like:

String sql = "INSERT INTO "+tableName+" ("+columnName+") VALUES (@xml)";

And since the first child is always the xml node, you can replace the encoding with the following statement.

xmlToSave.FirstChild.InnerText = "version=\"1.0\" encoding=\"UTF-16\"";

All in all it would look like that:

void SaveXmlToDatabase(DbConnection connection,
      XmlDocument xmlToSave,
      String tableName, String columnName);
{
   String sql = "INSERT INTO "+tableName+" ("+columnName+") VALUES (@xml)";

   using (DbCommand command = connection.CreateCommand())
   {
      xmlToSave.FirstChild.InnerText = "version=\"1.0\" encoding=\"UTF-16\"";             
      command.CommandText = sql;
      command.Parameters.Add(
        new SqlParameter("@xml", SqlDbType.Xml) 
           {Value = new SqlXml(new XmlTextReader(xmlToSave.InnerXml
                       , XmlNodeType.Document, null)) });


      DbTransaction trans = connection.BeginTransaction();
      try
      {
         command.ExecuteNonQuery();
         trans.Commit();
      }
      catch (Exception)
      {
         trans.Rollback();
         throw;
      }
   }
}