The following topics provide an overview of how to create a client application that works with solidDB. The information applies primarily to C-language programs that use the ODBC driver.

A client application, or client for short, is a program that submits requests (SQL queries) to the server and gets results back from the server.

A client program is separate from the server program. In many cases, the client runs on a separate computer. Using Shared Memory Access (SMA) or Linked Library Access (LLA), you can link the client code directly to the server code so that both run as a single process. For more information, see Shared memory access and linked library access.

Since the client is a separate program, it cannot directly call functions in the server. Instead, it must use a communications protocol (such as TCP/IP or named pipes) to communicate with the server. Different platforms support different protocols. On some platforms, you might need to link a specific library file (that supports a specific protocol) to your application so that your application can communicate with the server.