How to check for database availability

Question

I have the following code to test DB connection, it runs periodically to test for DB availability:

private bool CheckDbConn()
{
   SqlConnection conn = null;
   bool result = true;

   try
   {
       conn = DBConnection.getNewCon();
       ConnectionState conState = conn.State;

       if (conState == ConnectionState.Closed || conState == ConnectionState.Broken)
       {
          logger.Warn(LogTopicEnum.Agent, "Connection failed in DB connection test on CheckDBConnection");
          return false;
       }             
   }
   catch (Exception ex)
   {
      logger.Warn(LogTopicEnum.Agent, "Error in DB connection test on CheckDBConnection", ex);
      return false; // any error is considered as db connection error for now
   }
   finally
   {
      try
      {
         if (conn != null)
         {
            conn.Close();
         }
      }
      catch (Exception ex)
      {
         logger.Warn(LogTopicEnum.Agent, "Error closing connection on CheckDBConnection", ex);
         result = false;
      }
   }
   return result;
}

And:

static public SqlConnection getNewCon()
{
    SqlConnection newCon = new SqlConnection();
    newCon.ConnectionString = DBConnection.ConnectionString; // m_con.ConnectionString;
    newCon.Open();
    return newCon;
}

My question is: will this work as expected?

Specifically, I'm concerned about the test of the ConnectionState. Is it possible that the state will be: connecting (since Open() is synchronous)?

What should I do in that case?

Answer 1

You can try like this.

    public bool IsServerConnected()
    {
        using (var l_oConnection = new SqlConnection(DBConnection.ConnectionString))
        {
            try
            {
                l_oConnection.Open();
                return true;
            }
            catch (SqlException)
            {
                return false;
            }
        }
    }

Answer 2

SqlConnection will throw a SqlException when it cannot connect to the server.

public static class SqlExtensions
{
    public static bool IsAvailable(this SqlConnection connection)
    {
        try
        {
            connection.Open();
            connection.Close();
        }
        catch(SqlException)
        {
            return false;
        }

        return true;
    }
}

Usage:

using(SqlConnection connection = GetConnection())
{
    if(connection.IsAvailable())
    {
        // Success
    }
}