[asp.net] Escape quote in web.config connection string

I have a connection string in my web config:

<add name="MyConString" connectionString="Server=dbsrv;User ID=myDbUser;Password=somepass"word" providerName="System.Data.SqlClient" />

As you see, there is a quotation sign ( " ) in the password (given from other dept. I can't change this db users password).

How do I have to escape the quote in this connection string?

Btw: I already tried & quot; in the string. That didn't work - ado.net got an ArgumenException then: "Format of the initialization string does not conform to specification starting at index 57." 57 is where the & quot; is in my connection string. I also tried enclosing the password part in ' - didn't work either.

Also tried "" and \" - web.config can't be parsed then.

Thanks for the solution:

I had to combine the escaping of the double quote and putting the password in single quotes:

<add name="MyConString" connectionString="Server=dbsrv;User ID=myDbUser;Password='somepass&quot;word'" providerName="System.Data.SqlClient" />

Use " That should work.

Odeds answer is almost complete. Just one thing to add.

1. Escape xml special chars like Emanuele Greco said.
2. Put the password in single quotes like Oded said
3. (this one is new) Escape single ticks with another single tick (ref)

having this password="'; this sould be a valid connection string:

connectionString='Server=dbsrv;User ID=myDbUser;Password='"&&;'

if " isn't working then try " instead.

connectionString="Server=dbsrv;User ID=myDbUser;Password=somepass"word"

Since the web.config is XML, you need to escape the five special characters:

& -> & ampersand, U+0026
< -> < left angle bracket, less-than sign, U+003C
> -> > right angle bracket, greater-than sign, U+003E
" -> " quotation mark, U+0022
' -> ' apostrophe, U+0027

+ is not a problem, I suppose.

Duc Filan adds: You should also wrap your password with single quote ':

connectionString="Server=dbsrv;User ID=myDbUser;Password='somepass"word'"