Re: Informix connectivity

marchey@interval-intl.com wrote: :I have an Online 7.2 database. I have purchased CLI for the INET piece on the :server. I will run on HP, Sun Solaris, Aix, and SCO platforms. I have an :application written in ANSI C++ that runs on Windows95 and NT. : :I do not want to implement ODBC because we will be deploying the application :over many machines and do not want to incur the overhead of configuration for :each machine. :Can someone please recommend software to provide a native connection from a C++ :application to INET/Informix? Our evaluation pointed us to ILOG. I don't know ILOG. If you refer to the french company at http://www.ilog.fr they seem to have a connectivity problem. I can't get any further into their site than seeing part of the main page. If your application run on Windows 95 and NT only and not on the servers you mention, you don't need CLI/I-Net (now I-Connect) for the server. It's unclear from the above whether you have purchased these for the servers or Windows. If you are conserned about configuration on deployment you sure don't want these products at all if they can be avoided. You say want a "native" connection from C++ to I-Net. You can do it via ESQL/C. However if your application is running on Windows 95/NT you have to install I-Net on each PC. As this is the hardest part of the installation of the Informix connectivity products (CLI is simpler) you want to avoide that as well. So this "native" connection isn't helpfull unless you could connect directly to the server. You have to configure some connectivity software whatever you do on each PC. There isn't (yet) any such software that requires no configuration at all. Although you say you want to avoide it ODBC is realy the answer. With server based ODBC drivers you install and configure a set of drivers on the server ones. These are usually very simple to do. Thereafter you need only install one generic ODBC driver on each PC and they will usually connect with no problems if your basic TCP/IP is done right. No need for hosts or services files with entries compatible with your server and other more or less cryptic setup procedures. You now also have the significant advantage of writing to a standard interface that you can be reasonably assured will be available for some time. (Do check the 3.0 and 3.5 versions of the ODBC libraries from Microsoft however, to make sure you know how they will work.) Check out http://www.openlinksw.com or http://www.vision.sco.com for ODBC drivers. :Thanks in advance, : :Mary Archey :Director of Product Development :CCS International Nils.Myklebust@idg.no NM Data AS, P.O.Box 9090 Gronland, N-0133 Oslo, Norway My opinions are those of my company The Informix FAQ is at http://www.iiug.org