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WCF-SQL Adapter and Login Using Certificates

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This post is a summary of an e-mail conversation by Thiago Almeida.

While using the WCF-SQL adapter through the ‘Consume Adapter Service’ Visual Studio plug-in available with WCF LOB Adapter SDK, you can see the Certificates option.If you have the certificates properly set up, you can use this option to connect to SQL Server using the certificates and generate metadata for the operations. You might want to use the same setup at runtime when you configure the physical ports but you don’t see the option to use certificates when configuring the send ports (Credentials tab) or receive locations (Other tab). So, why is it that the adapter supports use of certificates at design-time but not at run time.

Well, the fact is that the certificates option is not supported at all be it design time or run time. In Consumer Adapter Service for SQL adapter, there are only two modes of authentication.

  • SQL authentication – when you select the Username option
  • Windows authentication – when you select any of the remaining three options (None, Windows, or Certificate)

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So, even if you selected the Certificate option, internally the adapter uses Windows authentication at design-time. At run time, because the Certificate option is not available, you can select None for Windows authentication.