The SDBC Driver for dBase

Apache OpenOffice Developer's Guide

Database Access

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• Architecture
• Example: Querying the Bibliography Database

• Data Sources in Apache OpenOffice API

• DataSources

• The DataSource Service
• Queries

• Adding and Editing Predefined Queries
• Runtime Settings For Predefined Queries
• The SingleSelectQueryComposer
• The SQLQueryComposer

• Forms and Reports
• Document Links
• Tables and Columns

• Connections

• Connecting Through a DataSource
• Connecting Using the DriverManager and a Database URL
• Connecting Through a Specific Driver
• Driver Specifics

• The SDBC Driver for JDBC
• The SDBC Driver for ODBC
• The SDBC Driver for Adabas D
• The SDBC Driver for ADO
• The SDBC Driver for dBase
• The SDBC Driver for Flat File Formats
• The SDBC Driver for Apache OpenOffice Calc Files
• The SDBC Driver for address books
• The SDBC Driver for embedded HSQL databases

• Connection Pooling
• Piggyback Connections

• Manipulating the Data

• The RowSet Service

• Usage
• Events and Other Notifications
• Clones of the RowSet Service

• Statements

• Creating Statements
• Inserting and Updating Data
• Getting Data from a Table

• Result Sets

• Retrieving Values from Result Sets
• Moving the Result Set Cursor
• Using the getXXX Methods
• Scrollable Result Sets
• Modifiable Result Sets
• Update
• Insert
• Delete
• Seeing Changes in Result Sets

• ResultSetMetaData
• Using Prepared Statements
• PreparedStatement From DataSource Queries

• Database Design

• Using DDL to Change the Database Design
• Using SDBCX to Access the Database Design

• Catalog Service
• Table Service
• Column Service
• Index Service
• Key Service
• View Service
• Group Service
• User Service
• The Descriptor Pattern
• Adding an Index
• Creating a User
• Adding a Group

• Using DBMS Features

• Stored Procedures

• Writing Database Drivers

• SDBC Driver
• Driver Service
• Connection Service
• XDatabaseMetaData Interface
• Statements
• Support Scalar Functions

• Open Group CLI Numeric Functions
• Open Group CLI String Functions
• Open Group CLI Time and Date Functions
• Open Group CLI System Functions
• Open Group CLI Conversion Functions

• Handling Unsupported Functionality
• Extending Database Drivers

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The dBase driver is one of the basic driver implementations and supports the service com.sun.star.sdbcx.Driver. This driver has a number of limitations concerning its abilities to modify the database structure and the extent of its SQL support. The URL for this driver is:

 sdbc:dbase:<folder or file url> 

For instance:

 sdbc:dbase:file:///d:/user/database/biblio

Similar to the SDBC driver for ODBC, this driver supports the connection info property CharSet to set different text encodings. The second possible property is ShowDeleted. When it is set to true, deleted rows in a table are still visible. In this state, it is not allowed to delete rows.

The following table shows the shortcomings of the SDBCX part of the dBase driver.

Object	create	alter
table	●	●
column	●	●
key
index	●	●
group
user

The driver has the following conditions in its support for SQL statements:

• The SELECT statement can not contain more than one table in the FROM clause.
• For comparisons the following operators are valid: =, <, >, <>, >=, <=, LIKE, NOT LIKE, IS NULL, IS NOT NULL.
• Parameters are allowed, but must be denoted with a leading colon (SELECT * FROM biblio WHERE Author LIKE :MyParam) or with a single question mark (SELECT * FROM biblio WHERE Author LIKE ?).
• The driver provides a ResultSet that supports bookmarks to records.
• The first instance of Apache OpenOffice API that accesses a dBase database locks the files for exclusive writing. The lock is never released until the Apache OpenOffice API instance, which has obtained the exclusive write access, is closed. This severely limits the access to a dBase database in a network.

Content on this page is licensed under the Public Documentation License (PDL).