pony-odbc¶
Pony wrappers and simple API for iODBC or unixODBC.
Status¶
"In Motion"™
Please feel free to test it and provide feedback on the design and API.
See https://github.com/redvers/pony-odbc for installation instructions, dependencies, and initial configuration.
What is ODBC?¹¶
The Microsoft Open Database Connectivity (ODBC) interface is a C programming language interface that makes it possible for applications to access data from various database management systems (DBMSs). ODBC is a low-level, high-performance interface that is designed specifically for relational data stores.
The ODBC interface allows maximum interoperability-an application can access data in diverse DBMSs through a single interface. Moreover, that application is independent of any DBMS from which it accesses data. Users of the application can add software components called drivers, which interface between an application and a specific DBMS.
What is pony-odbc?¶
pony-odbc consists of two APIs.
- The raw FFI API (you hopefully never need this)
- The safer "simpler"™ API provided by ODBCEnv, ODBCDbc, and ODBCStmt
The ODBC / pony-odbc model¶
Users of ODBC operates on three types of handles, "Environment", "Database",
and "Statement". In pony-odbc, these are represented by ODBCEnv,
ODBCDbc, and ODBCStmt respectively.
ODBC Environment Handle / ODBCEnv¶
This is the global context which is global in nature, such as being able to list all of the connections or available database drivers.
An Environment is needed to create a Database Environment ODBCDbc.
ODBC Database Handle / ODBCDbc¶
This is the object that represents a single database connection. On this object you can query and set parameters such as whether this connection autocommits after every statement, whether the connection is read-only / read-write.
Once you have created and configured your ODBCDbc object, you can connect
to the database using the .connect(dsn) function.
ODBC Statement Handle / ODBCStmt¶
This is the main "simplified"™ API which you used to prepare your SQL statements, populate your parameters and arguments, and execute your queries.
Where to start¶
Take a look in the examples/ directory for a simple example to start you off.
ODBCEnv for information on configuring the global environment.
ODBCDbc for information on configuring a database connection.
ODBCStmt for information on preparing and executing queries.
Citations:¶
[¹]Microsoft ODBC Specifications