OLEDB and MSSQL

Question: The .NET SDK offers data provider implementations for OLEDB and Microsoft SQL Server. Is it possible to access a Microsoft SQL Server database also via OLEDB? When would you use an OLEDB implementation and when a Microsoft SQL Server implementation?

Answer: MS SQL Server can be accessed via OLEDB. If you want to keep your program database independent then OLEDB is the preferred way. However, MS SQL Server offers a specialized provider implementation, which allows a more efficient way to access data stored in an MS SQL Server than the OLEDB implementation.