Often application developers can recompile existing code for use in. NET platform is compelling where new development is required, but in many cases timescale, business risk, and overall cost factors favor code re-use and incremental modernization. In data integration and consolidation scenarios from ETL to BI, ODBC’s ubiquity is invaluable in bringing data from both packaged and custom applications together. Phew! How to juggle these pressures and stay sane? There may also be pressures to consolidate and standardize application platforms alongside pressure to modernize existing applications, re-engineer business processes, increase information integration, and introduce business intelligence. For some databases, including Microsoft SQL Server, ODBC actually fulfills the role of proprietary native API.Ĭorporate IT and enterprise developers live in a very heterogeneous environment and have to support an accumulated legacy spanning multiple languages, operating systems, and data sources. In some cases ODBC even out-performed proprietary APIs when the driver adopted strategies to overcome weak default behavior in the underlying native API. Research soon showed that layering ODBC on top of proprietary native APIs usually has minimal performance impact. In the early days of ODBC, many perceived this to be a weakness in first generation ODBC drivers. ODBC can, and often is, implemented on top of a proprietary API. Second, even ignoring the API bridges, ODBC will provide users of the data source with the widest choice of third-party software since ODBC has been around longest and accumulated the widest selection of tools and applications. Why? First, there are bridges from all the other APIs to ODBC, so as soon as ODBC is enabled so are all the others. Implement ODBC first and evaluate requirements for the others afterwards. What is the best strategy if resources are limited or time to delivery is important? The answer is simple. Developing drivers for all of these requires significant time, effort, and expertise. The industry standard APIs required to enable access by developers, third-party tools and application packages are ADO.NET, JDBC, ODBC and OLE DB. So what makes ODBC popular with different industry factions and why will ODBC remain popular for the foreseeable future?įor the data source owner ODBC is a must. ERP, CRM, and SCM packages all use ODBC as do query, analysis, reporting and ETL packages as well as productivity applications such as Microsoft Office. ODBC is very popular for custom enterprise application development and is widely supported by market leading ISVs. For any data source that lacks an ODBC driver there are numerous driver development kits and driver development shops waiting to help you plug that gap! It goes without saying that no respectable relational database lacks an ODBC driver. For example, many COBOL applications use ODBC for database access as do dynamic languages such as PHP, Perl, Python and Ruby along with Microsoft Access and other RADs.ĭespite being conceptually limited to relational databases, no significant data source lacks an ODBC driver: text files, Excel spreadsheets, ISAMs such as dBase, Paradox, C-ISAM, Btrieve and VSAM-you name it and an ODBC driver is most likely available. Though often thought of as an API for C and C++ applications, ODBC is frequently used with other languages. Probably the best known implementation of ISO/IEC 9075-3:2003 SQL Call Level Interface (part 3 of the complete SQL standard), ODBC is included in Windows, MacOS, all major Linux distributions, and is readily available for many Unix versions including AIX, HP-UX, Solaris, and FreeBSD. This article explains why and will explore the relationship between Microsoft SQL Server and ODBC and discuss where ODBC may go in the future.Ĭonceived as a broadly based, multi-platform, multi-database data access technology, ODBC has been an outstanding success. Fifteen years after its launch, ODBC is a firmly entrenched cornerstone of the software industry.
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