Summary

In this chapter you learned about ADO.NET, the most recent evolution of ActiveX Data Objects. You saw that there are great benefits to using ADO.NET, including the following:

• Interoperability

• Maintainability

• Programmability

• Performance

• Scalability

You also received a high-level overview of the ADO.NET object model, and you learned that the DataSet is the centerpiece of an ADO.NET solution. In each DataSet, there's a RelationsCollection and a TablesCollection. In each DataTable of the TablesCollection, there's a columns collection and a rows collection. You also saw some code samples for dynamically building an ADO.NET DataSet.

As you progress through this book, you'll look deeper into the object model and write code against the ADO.NET objects.