ASP.NET 2.0: Storing profiles in an external SQL Server

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Another question I received recently that I wanted to follow up on was whether it's possible to store data for the ASP.NET 2.0 Profile feature in a separate SQL Server database (as opposed to the default, which uses a local instance of SQL Server 2005 Express).

The answer is yes, you can configure any of the ASP.NET providers to use a separate SQL instance instead of the default. To do so, you need to create and configure the target database, and point ASP.NET to it.

To configure the database, you use the aspnet_regsql.exe command-line tool:

https://msdn2.microsoft.com/library/x28wfk74(en-us,vs.80).aspx

Then, use the <profile> element in web.config to point to your target database:

https://msdn2.microsoft.com/library/ms164654(en-us,vs.80).aspx