How to grant the database owner (DBO) the EXTERNAL ACCESS ASSEMBLY permission? - sql

Question

When I try to create assembly in SQL 2008 from .Net assembly (.Net 3.5) I am getting the below error, error says that I have to set either of the below properties as true, how can I do that?
The database owner (DBO) has EXTERNAL ACCESS ASSEMBLY permission as
TRUE
The database has the TRUSTWORTHY database property on
The assembly is signed with a certificate or an asymmetric key that
has a corresponding login with EXTERNAL ACCESS ASSEMBLY permission.
The complete error is below,
CREATE ASSEMBLY for assembly 'SQLLogger' failed because assembly 'SQLLogger' is not authorized for PERMISSION_SET = EXTERNAL_ACCESS. The assembly is authorized when either of the following is true: the database owner (DBO) has EXTERNAL ACCESS ASSEMBLY permission and the database has the TRUSTWORTHY database property on; or the assembly is signed with a certificate or an asymmetric key that has a corresponding login with EXTERNAL ACCESS ASSEMBLY permission.

Answer 1

This worked for me:
EXEC sp_changedbowner 'sa'
ALTER DATABASE [dbase] SET trustworthy ON
and I also did this:
sp_configure 'show advanced options', 1;
GO
RECONFIGURE;
GO
sp_configure 'clr enabled', 1;
GO
RECONFIGURE;
GO
sp_configure 'show advanced options', 0;
GO
RECONFIGURE;
GO

Answer 2

⚠ ‼ Please do not set TRUSTWORTHY ON ... ⚠
...unless absolutely necessary‼ And, it should pretty much never be "necessary", even when loading an Assembly that you did not build (you can always add another certificate, or worst-case: sign after loading into SQL Server), or when loading .NET Framework libraries that aren't "supported" and hence aren't already in SQL Server's CLR host (you can use the certificate they are signed with, or worst-case: sign after loading into SQL Server). Setting the database to TRUSTWORTHY ON opens up a security hole, and for more info on that, please see:
PLEASE, Please, please Stop Using Impersonation, TRUSTWORTHY, and Cross-DB Ownership Chaining
Instead,
it is much better to do the following:
USE [master];
CREATE ASYMMETRIC KEY [SomeKey]
AUTHORIZATION [dbo]
FROM EXECUTABLE FILE = 'C:\path\to\Some.dll';
CREATE LOGIN [SomeLogin]
FROM ASYMMETRIC KEY [SomeKey];
GRANT EXTERNAL ACCESS ASSEMBLY TO [SomeLogin]; -- or "UNSAFE" instead of "EXTERNAL ACCESS"
The above only needs to be done once per Instance, per key. So if you use the same snk / pfx file for all of your assemblies, then the steps shown above only need to be done once per SQL Server Instance; the number of Assemblies and databases containing those Assemblies does not matter. Or, if signing with a Certificate, then just replace ASYMMETRIC KEY with CERTIFICATE in the example code shown above.
This approach allows you to keep better security on the database (by keeping TRUSTWORTHY set to OFF) and allows for more granular control of which assemblies are even allowed to be set to EXTERNAL_ACCESS and/or UNSAFE (since you can separate by using different keys for signing and Logins based on those different keys).
However, if you must use the TRUSTWORTHY ON method, then the database owner does not need to be sa. The requirement is merely that the Login registered as the database owner has been granted either EXTERNAL ACCESS ASSEMBLY or UNSAFE ASSEMBLY (same two permissions shown above for the Asymmetric Key-based Login). Meaning:
USE [master];
GRANT UNSAFE ASSEMBLY TO [{Login-that-is-dbo-for-DB-containing-Assembly}];
For a more detailed walk-through of the security options, please see the following article that I wrote on SQL Server Central: Stairway to SQLCLR Level 4: Security (EXTERNAL and UNSAFE Assemblies).
For a detailed walk-through of how to automate this via Visual Studio / SSDT, please see the following 3 articles (a 3-part series), also on SQL Server Central:
Stairway to SQLCLR Level 6: Development Tools Intro
Stairway to SQLCLR Level 7: Development and Security
Stairway to SQLCLR Level 8: Using Visual Studio to work around SSDT
Also, since writing those 3 articles, I have come up with an easier method using T4 templates but have not had time to write that up yet. When I do, I will update this answer with a link to that article.
UPDATE
SQL Server 2017 introduced a new complication in the form of a server-level configuration option named "CLR strict security". It is enabled by default and requires that ALL Assemblies, even those marked as SAFE, be signed with a Certificate or Asymmetric Key, have the associated Login, and that the Login has the UNSAFE ASSEMBLY permission granted (not good enough to grant EXTERNAL ACCESS ASSEMBLY). Please see my answer to the following S.O. question for more details on this new "feature":
CLR Strict Security on SQL Server 2017

Answer 3

You must set these settings in the project file! When you right click on your project, click the Database Settings from the project configuration and select the miscellaneous tab. You should see something similar to what I have here:
This is the same question as: Error Running CLR Stored Proc

Answer 4

Following code worked for me for integrated security:
ALTER DATABASE dtabasename SET TRUSTWORTHY ON;
GO
ALTER AUTHORIZATION ON DATABASE::dtabasename TO [DOMAIN\UserName]
GO

Answer 5

This works for:
Visual Studio 2015 Update 2.
Visual Studio 2017.
Visual Studio 2017 and SQL Server 2019 (thanks #Ramkumar Sambandam).
In your project settings, select "External Access":
On publish, the error message says that it cannot accept "EXTERNAL_ACCESS" unless the assembly is set to "Trustworthy".
So, in the project settings, set the assembly to "Trustworthy":
This meant that I was able to run a sample user defined function that listed files on the local hard drive.
If the security is still too restrictive, add the attribute DataAccess = DataAccessKind.Read to your UDF, e.g.:
[Microsoft.SqlServer.Server.SqlFunction(FillRowMethodName = "FindFiles", DataAccess = DataAccessKind.Read, TableDefinition = "FileName nvarchar(500), FileSize bigint, CreationTime datetime")]
Update 2017-07-02
On SQL Server 2016 + Visual Studio 2015, you might also have to do the following:
use master;grant unsafe assembly to [Domain\Username];
Run any programs (such as Visual Studio or any C# utilities) in Administrator mode to give them sufficient permissions to publish UNSAFE assemblies.
If nothing works, try connecting using username sa and your administrator password. This will always work, regardless of whether Visual Studio is run in Administrator mode or not.
Update 2020-01-17
Updated list of compatible VS + SQL Server combinations.

Answer 6

This is how I managed to make it work:
ALTER DATABASE databasename SET trustworthy ON
sp_configure 'show advanced options', 1;
GO
RECONFIGURE;
GO
sp_configure 'clr enabled', 1;
GO
RECONFIGURE;
GO
sp_configure 'show advanced options', 0;
GO
RECONFIGURE;
GO
/
DROP ASSEMBLY assemblyname
GO
CREATE ASSEMBLY assemblyname
FROM 0x4D5A9000.....
WITH PERMISSION_SET = EXTERNAL_ACCESS

Answer 7

this single line solves the problem for me
use master;
grant external access assembly to [domain\username]