Using Data Readers

As with Windows forms, you can use data readers to access data, not just datasets (see "Using a Data Reader" in Chapter 22 for more on data readers). To see how this works, see the WebDataReader example on the CD-ROM. In that example, I use an OleDbCommand object to retrieve the authors table and connect that table to a data grid. Here's the code—note that you use the ExecuteReader method of the command object to get the data reader:

Private Sub Page_Load(ByVal sender As System.Object, _
    ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles MyBase.Load
    OleDbConnection1.Open()
    Dim Reader1 As System.Data.OleDb.OleDbDataReader
    Reader1 = OleDbCommand1.ExecuteReader()
    DataGrid1.DataSource = Reader1
    DataGrid1.DataBind()
    Reader1.Close()
End Sub

You can see the results in Figure 23.12, where the data from the data reader is displayed in the data grid in this example.

Figure 23.12: The WebDataReader example.