Connecting to Windows Internal Database (WID)

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Whilst trying to figure out issues with a service which uses Windows Internal Database (WID) I came into the issue of actually connecting and managing it…

Steps to connect to WID:

  1. Download and install Microsoft SQL Server Manager (found here) onto the machine hosting the instance
  2. Run Microsoft SQL Server Manager (SSMS) as Administrator (if not run as Administrator a permissions exception will be thrown when connecting)
  3. Enter the connection string, this will be different depending on the Windows version:
    1. Windows 2003 – Windows 2008: \\.\pipe\MSSQL$MICROSOFT##SSEE\sql\query
    2. Windows 2012 onward: \\.\pipe\MICROSOFT##WID\tsql\query
  4. Connect using Windows Authentication
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