SQLDrivers lists driver descriptions and driver attribute keywords. This function is implemented solely by the Driver Manager.

When SQLDrivers 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 SQLDrivers 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.

SQLDrivers returns the driver description in the szDriverDesc argument. It returns additional information about the driver in the szDriverAttributes argument as a list of keyword-value pairs. Each pair is terminated with a null byte, and the entire list is terminated with a null byte (that is, two null bytes mark the end of the list). For example, a dBASE driver might return the following list of attributes ("\0" represents a null byte):

If szDriverAttributes is not large enough to hold the entire list, the list is truncated, SQLDrivers returns SQLSTATE 01004 (Data truncated), and the length of the list (excluding the final null termination byte) is returned in pcbDrvrAttr.

Driver attribute keywords are added from the ODBC.INF file when the driver is installed.

An application can call SQLDrivers multiple times to retrieve all driver descriptions. The Driver Manager retrieves this information from the ODBCINST.INI file or registry. When there are no more descriptions, the Driver Manager returns SQL_NO_DATA_FOUND. If SQLDrivers is called with SQL_FETCH_NEXT immediately after it returns SQL_NO_DATA_FOUND, it will return the first driver description.

If SQL_FETCH_NEXT is passed to SQLDrivers the very first time it is called, it will return the first driver description.

Because SQLDrivers is implemented in the Driver Manager, it is supported for all drivers regardless of a particular driver's conformance level.

ODBC Router

ODBC Router transparently makes all ODBC drivers on a central Windows Server useable by your network's Linux, Macintosh and Windows systems. Three years in the making, ODBC Router has saved its customers millions of dollars in DLL installation and ODBC 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 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.

ODBC or JDBC?

JDBC drivers launch a CPU-intensive virtual machine in the background on your machine, which is bad for shared servers and for battery powered laptops 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!