Wow.. Great support you got there Chris!

Well, I think I've screwed up again.  All I have been trying to do for the last day is create a backup of the database that my DNN site runs off of that I can FTP to Network Solutions for them to restore and start the migration process.  It's still called "Database.mdf" and it's in the App_Data directory just like the default DNN setup.  It's been a pain for me.  I eventually learned that to get SQL Server Management Studio that you had to uninstall the version of SQL Server 2008 Express that loads with VWD 2008 Express and install SQL Server 2008 Express from scratch with all the Tools.  So I did that and my website still ran fine on my localhost.  Then I opened Management Studio thinking that I would easily be able connect to the database, right click on it and select Backup under Tasks and be off to the races.  Not so, in my experience.  I was able to connect to the my website database, but I did so using SQL Server Compact Edition as a server and using that type of Authentication.  However, I never could find an option to Backup the database.  Finally, I gave up and tried to open my website on VWD and it failed because it couldn't connect to the Database because of a login error.

I don't really remember ever putting any kind of password on the database or anything when I was working with Management Studio, but all I can think is that I might have changed the Server and Authentication types when I was messing with the file.  The one thing I do remember is that when I first found the database.mdf file using Managment Studio it gave me some error message that the file wasn't configured correctly to work with Management Studio and asked if I wanted to "Fix" or "Adjust" it to work.  The default answer was Yes, so I clicked it.  Whatever process it executed took about 1 second and Studio connected to the database.mdf.

In VWD, there is no option for connecting to a database using SQL Server Compact Edition as a Server, so I can't figure out how to tell my website to connect to the database NOR can I figure out how to go back into Management Studio and undo any changes that I might have made to the database.  Does any of this make sense to anyone who can help me figure this out?

This is pretty easy.

1. Open up SQL Server Management Studio (just in case you don't have it, it comes with SQL Server 2008 Express on Micorosft.com), and connect to whatever local SQL server's running.

2. Right-click on the "Databases" folder, and select "Attach..."

3. Click "Add" and navigate to your DNN installation's Database.mdf, and select it. This will load the Database.mdf file into SQL Server Management Studio as a database.

4. Right-click the database.mdf you just attached, and select "Tasks" and then "Backup." It will tell you where it's making the backup.

That's it!