Registering the .Net Data Provider for InterSystems Caché and InterSystems IRIS as DbProviderFactories

This small tutorial described how to „register“ the ADO.NET Database Provider (Driver) for InterSystems IRIS and InterSystems Caché on a Windows machine.

Before we start: Why need the ADO.NET Database Provider to be registered?

ADO.NET provides factory classes standardize the way programmer will create a provider-specific Connection. This simplifies the way programmers create provider specific instances in a generic data access API. Details about that can be found here: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/dotnet/framework/data/adonet/obtaining-a-dbproviderfactory
If an Application use this system to obtain a list of available Data Providers, the provider needs to be registered. In my example I want to use the .Net Data Provider for InterSystems IRIS in a MS SQL Server Integration Service Project. This Application (SSIS) use a Connection Dialog that lists all on this machine available\known Data Provider:

As you can see there are no InterSystems Provider available. The following section describes what needs to be done to list the provider on this connection dialog.

machine.config?!

Each .NET Framework data provider that supports a factory-based class registers configuration information in the DbProviderFactories section of the machine.config file on the local computer. The DbProviderFactories class uses the machine.config file(s) to resolve the invariant name to the appropriate provider factory type. The machine.config file is located in …\<windows>\Microsoft.NET\Framework\<version>\config\machine.config.

On my computer e.g:
C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v4.0.30319\Config
and
C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework64\v4.0.30319\Config

Add DbProviderFactories

Open the machine.config file with a text editor and search for “system.data”. You found possibly an empty block like this:

These are the values we have to insert for IRIS:

<add name="InterSystems IRIS Data Provider"
invariant="InterSystems.Data.IRISClient"
description=".Net Data Provider for InterSystems IRIS"
type="InterSystems.Data.IRISClient.IRISFactory,
InterSystems.Data.IRISClient,
Version=4.5.0.0,
Culture=neutral,
PublicKeyToken=ad350a26c4a4447c"/>

… and this for Caché

<add name="InterSystems Cache Data Provider"
invariant="InterSystems.Data.CacheClient"
description=".Net Data Provider for InterSystems Cache"
type="InterSystems.Data.CacheClient.CacheFactory,
Intersystems.Data.CacheClient,
Version=4.5.0.0,
Culture=neutral,
PublicKeyToken=ad350a26c4a4447c"/>

The “system.block” should now look like this:

Pay attention to the <DbProviderFactories></DbProviderFactories> tags!

Now start Visual Studio (Data Tools), create a SSIS Projekt and open the Connection Manager again. The dialog should look like this:

Great! The providers are listed!
... unfortunately that is not enough. The providers are not working if you select one of the new entries you get this message:

That’s happened because the Provider are not known it the GAC (=global assembly cache), so the entries can’t be found*.

Register InterSystems provider in the GAC

To registered the InterSystems provider on a computer you can do it this way:

Find the files first:

Intersystems.Data.CacheClient.dll (for Caché)

InterSystems.Data.IRISClient.dll (for IRIS)

Within an IRIS installation you can find the file e.g. …\dev\dotnet\bin\v4.5

Copy the files on your computer in a folder (InterSystems.Data.IRISClient.dll).

Now you are able to register the Provider in the assembly cache with the gacutil.

Using gacutil
 

If you have a Visual Studio installed you can use the Visual Studio Developer Command Prompt:

That has the advantage that you don’t need to look for the gacutil path, for installation just type:

gacutil -i <full path to your dll>\InterSystems.Data.CacheClient.dll

e.g.: gacutil -i D:\dev\privat_repos\NativeCacheTest\lib\InterSystems.Data.CacheClient.dll

You should see the message: Assembly successfully added to the cache

To remove something from gac, use the option "-u": gacutil -u InterSystems.Data.CacheClient

Install both provider:

gacutil -i <full path to your dll>\InterSystems.Data.IRISClient.dll
gacutil -i <full path to your dll>\InterSystems.Data.CacheClient.dll

If you don’t have the “Visual Studio Developer Command Prompt” you need to search the gacutil executable first. On my computer it is located at: "C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft SDKs\Windows\v10.0A\bin\NETFX 4.8 Tools\gacutil.exe"

Install:

"C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft SDKs\Windows\v10.0A\bin\NETFX 4.8 Tools\gacutil.exe" -i D:\dev\privat_repos\NativeCacheTest\lib\InterSystems.Data.IRISClient.dll
"C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft SDKs\Windows\v10.0A\bin\NETFX 4.8 Tools\gacutil.exe" -i D:\dev\privat_repos\NativeCacheTest\lib\InterSystems.Data.CacheClient.dll

Remove:

"C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft SDKs\Windows\v10.0A\bin\NETFX 4.8 Tools\gacutil.exe" -u InterSystems.Data.CacheClient
"C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft SDKs\Windows\v10.0A\bin\NETFX 4.8 Tools\gacutil.exe" -u InterSystems.Data.IRISClient

It works! :-)

And now… if you open the SSIS Project again, navigate to the Connection Manager it should looks like this:

You can now select the IRIS provider, see and configure all available connections details.

Thanks for reading.