Connecting to Aras

To connect to Aras, use the Factory class to create a new connection. All you need to specify is the URL of the Aras instance and a User-Agent string. The use of unique User-Agents is strongly encouraged when using Innovator.Client so that administrators can track the tools that are using their Aras installation. After the connection is created, you can log in by specifying the database, user name, and password. If you need a list of databases, you can retrieve such a list using the GetDatabases() method

//using Innovator.Client;

var conn = Factory.GetConnection("URL", "USER_AGENT");
conn.Login(new ExplicitCredentials("DATABASE", "USER_NAME", "PASSWORD"));

Credentials

Several different credentials classes are available:

• AnonymousCredentials: Represents an attempt to log in to Aras anonymously. Currently, no connection in Innovator.Client actually supports using these credentials
• ExplicitCredentials: (Recommended) Allows you to log in to Aras using a database, user name, and password.
• ExplicitHashCredentials: Allows you to log in to Aras using a database, user name, and the MD5 hash of a password.
• WindowsCredentials: Allows you to log in to Aras using the current account which is logged in to Windows. Alternatively, you can specify an System.Net.ICredentials object specifying the credentials to use.

Customizing Authentication

If you would like to customize how authentication is handled, consider implementing Mapped Connections

Additional Control

For more control over how requests are sent, use the ConnectionPreferences parameter. For example, perhaps you want to specify a default timeout and add a new HTTP header to every request. The following code configures these preferences. It also creates the connection and logs in to Aras in a single step.

var prefs = new ConnectionPreferences() { Url = "URL" };
prefs.DefaultTimeout = 200000; // in milliseconds
prefs.Headers.UserAgent = "USER_AGENT";
prefs.Headers.Add("Header-Name", "Value");
prefs.Credentials = new ExplicitCredentials("DATABASE", "USER_NAME", "PASSWORD");
var conn = Factory.GetConnection(prefs);

Saving Connection Preferences

Connection preferences can be saved for later use in an XML file or blob. Using the default settings on a Windows computer, you can save preferences for later use:

var prefs = new ConnectionPreferences() { Url = "URL" };
prefs.DefaultTimeout = 200000 // in milliseconds
prefs.Headers.UserAgent = "USER_AGENT";
prefs.Headers.Add("Header-Name", "Value");
prefs.Credentials = new ExplicitCredentials("DATABASE", "USER_NAME", "PASSWORD");

var saved = SavedConnections.Load();
saved.Default = prefs;
saved.Save();

This makes authenticating at a later date very simple as you can create a connection with the following single line of code

var conn = Factory.GetConnection(SavedConnections.Load().Default);