SQLDescribeParam returns the description of a parameter marker associated with a prepared SQL statement.

When SQLDescribeParam returns SQL_ERROR or SQL_SUCCESS_WITH_INFO, an associated SQLSTATE value may be obtained by calling SQLError. The following table lists the SQLSTATE values commonly returned by SQLDescribeParam and explains each one in the context of this function; the notation "(DM)" precedes the descriptions of SQLSTATEs returned by the Driver Manager. The return code associated with each SQLSTATE value is SQL_ERROR, unless noted otherwise.

Parameter markers are numbered from left to right in the order they appear in the SQL statement.

SQLDescribeParam does not return the type (input, input/output or output) of a parameter in an SQL statement. Except in calls to procedures, all parameters in the SQL statements are input parameters. To determine the type of each parameter in a call to a procedure, an application calls SQLProcedureColumns.

ODBC Router

ODBC Router transparently makes all ODBC drivers on a central Windows Server useable by your network's iPhone/iPod, iPad, Linux, Mac and Windows systems. Years in the making here in the USA, ODBC Router has saved its customers millions of dollars in DLL installations and support costs for less than the price of a new PC and a few minutes installation time. ODBC Router provides a low cost, turnkey database network with enterprise class IT support.

Ditching the ODBC Administrator Control Panel:

By linking your application with the free ODBC Router client-side SDK instead of the ODBC Driver Manager, the need for your end-users to deal with driver installation or an ODBC Control Panel is gone! We even provide a setup function your code may call to display a "network browser" that enables your customer to "find" their ODBC Router server on the network, then "choose" the exact database they want to work with and finally return to your application with a fully-formed ODBC connection-string that may be stored and passed back to SQLConnect or SQLDriverConnect anytime your user wants to initiate a connection that data source. No more walking your customers through the process of adding data sources to ODBC Control Panel or, in the case of non-Windows computers, no need to worry about whether or not a compatible third-party ODBC Driver Manager has been installed for use with your code. (Remember that ODBC Router supports iPhone/iPod, iPad, Mac OS 9, Mac OS X, Linux and Windows.) If there ever are any client-side ODBC support issues, AugSoft can handle them directly with the customer freeing you to focus on the application.

JDBC?

JDBC-in-ODBC drivers (like some 'actual' ODBC drivers, lol) launch a CPU-intensive virtual machine in the background on your machine, which is bad for battery powered laptops, high-volume web servers or entry level desktops (that typically have slow busses and drives). As the world shifted to laptops and shared servers, the whole "virtual machine" concept became a support nightmare and so these days good Java apps are compiled to run as native (not emulated) code. Java developers may use the operating system's native ODBC support from within the JDBC class library using the sun.jdbc.odbc.JdbcOdbcDriver driver with a URL as shown below.

jdbc:odbc:dsn[;key=value]*

Example:

jdbc:odbc:finance;UID=cfo;

IT techs may then complete the database connection on the Customer's machine using ODBC Router or the database vendor's official ODBC driver.

NOTE: By creating ODBC data sources with ODBC Router, your apps will enjoy native speed and database independent connections from either Java/C/C++/C#/ObjC or PHP/PERL/Python/Ruby/BASIC on Linux, Macintosh and Windows. Also be aware that using ODBC Router with the Mac platform is an especially good idea because database vendors have not kept their Mac drivers in sync with Windows and there are actual third-party vendors who wrap freeware and JDBC drivers inside of ODBC "shells" without warning their customers! This problem is of great concern to developers because fake drivers almost always fly past the IT guys who test with speed deamon desktops, but fail the enterprise when user laptops and iMacs take too long to run queries or slowly corrupt the database when they do. IT guys often chalk this up to "network problems" leaving users with poison drivers to avoid their database. ODBC Router addresses this issue by enabling official vendor supported Windows ODBC drivers (on a Windows Server) to be accessed from all platforms, network wide.

ODBC 3.x?

It's not here yet. Even in 2010, most ODBC drivers are ODBC 1.x and 2.x. The ODBC Driver Manager translates between 3.x and 2.x or 2.x and 1.x ODBC calls. Therefore, if you don't need UNICODE, it's a bad idea to use ODBC 3.x API calls. That said, UNICODE is a Good Thing and there are actually at least three databases that natively support it now, so look for 3.x to be here soon.

Need ODBC API Help?

We really know ODBC and we routinely provide code-level ODBC help to our customers. Our low cost ODBC Router systems are available now at our online store and if your site buys them, you may open a ticket to ask ODBC development questions --we offer both E-Mail and On-Call support options in seven of the G8's timezones! Be sure to test your ODBC Router and ask for any needed installation help before purchase because we aren't Fry's --no refunds please, our prices are too low for such nonsense and we're too busy supporting real Customers!