Question

ODBC

Asked by: jahsexy18

What are the benefits and drawbacks of using ODBC to configure your client applications in an SQL server?

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Asked On
2005-03-23 at 19:23:57ID21362800
Tags

odbc

,

drawbacks

Topic

Miscellaneous Programming

Participating Experts
3
Points
500
Comments
3

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Answers

 

by: sajuksPosted on 2005-03-23 at 19:43:00ID: 13618597

PC software and mainframe vendors alike have adopted the standard and include ODBC drivers with their products. Beyond that, about the only other real benefit to using ODBC is that Microsoft backs it. Due to Microsoft's huge market presence, the fact that it backs a technology is reason in itself to consider using the technology. You can probably count on the technology, whether it's ODBC or something else, being around for awhile.
the general consensus is that ODBC drivers are not highly tuned for speed. The one-size-fits-all approach that ODBC takes to database access prevents it from taking advantage of some vendor-specific performance enhancements
//got this from a site long ago so dont know exactly where.

 

by: TriskelionPosted on 2005-03-23 at 21:03:39ID: 13618930

Quote from IODBC.ORG
   It is rapidly emerging as the industry standard for developing solutions that are language, platform and database independent.
http://www.iodbc.org/index.php?page=about

If you're using Visual C++ and MFC, you can't beat the ODBC implementation.
I love it because I can talk to a variety of databases without having to find (and learn) the API for each.  I frequently use ORACLE and mySQL in the same application and hate having to program to two different databases.  ODBC neutralizes the db interface and allows me to concentrate on the job rather than worrying about communicating with the database.

As far as db specific hooks, you can implement a lot of them with the ExecuteSQL() function, but this may make your code non-portable to other databases.

With ODBC, I can make a database out of a text file, a spreadsheet, and any relational database that has an ODBC driver.

I can get from 0 to 100 faster than others can get from 0 to 50 with custom APIs.

Obviously, there will be some overhead with the neutralization of the database interfaces.  Also, you may give up a lot of fancy tricks if you're really comfortable with a particular database brand.  

This all becomes moot if you ever switch from one db type to another as ODBC will save you an enormous amount of time.

 

by: harsha_dpPosted on 2005-03-23 at 23:06:25ID: 13619341

20120131-EE-VQP-002

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