diff --git a/CHANGELOG.md b/CHANGELOG.md
index c1a3320..1dbfb55 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG.md
+++ b/CHANGELOG.md
@@ -3,6 +3,7 @@
 Only accretive/fixative changes will be made from now on.
 
 * 1.3.next in progress
+  * Fix [#229](https://github.com/seancorfield/next-jdbc/issues/229) by adding `next.jdbc.connect/uri->db-spec` which converts a URI string to a db-spec hash map; in addition, if `DriverManager/getConnection` fails, it assumes it was passed a URI instead of a JDBC URL, and retries after calling that function and then recreating the JDBC URL (which should have the effect of moving the embedded user/password credentials into the properties structure instead of the URL).
   * Address [#228](https://github.com/seancorfield/next-jdbc/issues/228) by adding `PreparedStatement` caveat to the Oracle **Tips & Tricks** section.
 
 * 1.3.834 -- 2022-09-23
diff --git a/src/next/jdbc/connection.clj b/src/next/jdbc/connection.clj
index 4b0bd39..8efd593 100644
--- a/src/next/jdbc/connection.clj
+++ b/src/next/jdbc/connection.clj
@@ -132,21 +132,6 @@
                       :dbname-separator ":dsn="
                       :host :none}})
 
-(defn- ^Properties as-properties
-  "Convert any seq of pairs to a `java.util.Properties` instance."
-  [m]
-  (let [p (Properties.)]
-    (doseq [[k v] m]
-      (.setProperty p (name k) (str v)))
-    p))
-
-(defn- get-driver-connection
-  "Common logic for loading the designated JDBC driver class and
-  obtaining the appropriate `Connection` object."
-  [url timeout etc]
-  (when timeout (DriverManager/setLoginTimeout timeout))
-  (DriverManager/getConnection url (as-properties etc)))
-
 (def ^:private driver-cache
   "An optimization for repeated calls to get-datasource, or for get-connection
   called on a db-spec hash map, so that we only try to load the classes once."
@@ -359,6 +344,53 @@
   [s]
   [s {}])
 
+(defn- ^Properties as-properties
+  "Convert any seq of pairs to a `java.util.Properties` instance."
+  [m]
+  (let [p (Properties.)]
+    (doseq [[k v] m]
+      (.setProperty p (name k) (str v)))
+    p))
+
+(defn uri->db-spec
+  "clojure.java.jdbc (and some users out there) considered the URI format
+  to be an acceptable JDBC URL, i.e., with credentials embdedded in the string,
+  rather than as query parameters.
+
+  This function accepts a URI string, optionally prefixed with `jdbc:` and
+  returns a db-spec hash map."
+  [uri]
+  (let [{:keys [scheme userInfo host port path query]}
+        (j/from-java (java.net.URI. (str/replace uri #"^jdbc:" "")))
+        [user password] (when (seq userInfo) (str/split userInfo #":"))
+        properties (when (seq query)
+                     (into {}
+                           (map #(str/split % #"="))
+                           (str/split query #"\&")))]
+    (cond-> (assoc properties
+                   :dbtype scheme
+                   :host   host
+                   :port   port)
+      (seq path) (assoc :dbname (subs path 1))
+      user (assoc :user user)
+      password (assoc :password password))))
+
+(defn- get-driver-connection
+  "Common logic for loading the designated JDBC driver class and
+  obtaining the appropriate `Connection` object."
+  [url timeout etc]
+  (when timeout (DriverManager/setLoginTimeout timeout))
+  (try
+    (DriverManager/getConnection url (as-properties etc))
+    (catch Exception e
+      (try
+        (let [db-spec (uri->db-spec url)
+              [url' etc'] (spec->url+etc db-spec)]
+          (DriverManager/getConnection url' (as-properties (merge etc' etc))))
+        (catch Exception _
+          ;; if the fallback fails too, throw the original exception
+          (throw e))))))
+
 (defn- url+etc->datasource
   "Given a JDBC URL and a map of options, return a `DataSource` that can be
   used to obtain a new database connection."
diff --git a/test/next/jdbc/connection_string_test.clj b/test/next/jdbc/connection_string_test.clj
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..56a7e74
--- /dev/null
+++ b/test/next/jdbc/connection_string_test.clj
@@ -0,0 +1,41 @@
+;; copyright (c) 2019-2021 Sean Corfield, all rights reserved
+
+(ns next.jdbc.connection-string-test
+  "Tests for the main hash map spec to JDBC URL logic and the get-datasource
+  and get-connection protocol implementations.
+
+  At some point, the datasource/connection tests should probably be extended
+  to accept EDN specs from an external source (environment variables?)."
+  (:require [clojure.string :as str]
+            [clojure.test :refer [deftest is testing use-fixtures]]
+            [next.jdbc.connection :as c]
+            [next.jdbc.protocols :as p]
+            [next.jdbc.specs :as specs]
+            [next.jdbc.test-fixtures :refer [with-test-db db]]))
+
+(set! *warn-on-reflection* true)
+
+(use-fixtures :once with-test-db)
+
+(specs/instrument)
+
+(deftest test-uri-strings
+  (testing "datasource via String"
+    (let [db-spec (db)
+          db-spec (if (= "embedded-postgres" (:dbtype db-spec))
+                    (assoc db-spec :dbtype "postgresql")
+                    db-spec)
+          [url etc] (#'c/spec->url+etc db-spec)
+          {:keys [user password]} etc
+          etc (dissoc etc :user :password)
+          uri (-> url
+                  ;; strip jdbc: prefix for fun
+                  (str/replace #"^jdbc:" "")
+                  (str/replace #";" "?") ; for SQL Server tests
+                  (str/replace #":sqlserver" "") ; for SQL Server tests
+                  (cond-> (and user password)
+                    (str/replace #"://" (str "://" user ":" password "@"))))
+          ds (p/get-datasource (assoc etc :jdbcUrl uri))]
+      (when (and user password)
+        (with-open [con (p/get-connection ds {})]
+          (is (instance? java.sql.Connection con)))))))