ODBC Drivers for Linux/FreeBSD

This article describes the ODBC drivers provided by Exasol to connect applications running on Linux or FreeBSD with an Exasol system.

The Exasol ODBC drivers for Linux and FreeBSD are tested on the following systems:

  • Linux

    • CentOS 7

    • CentOS 8 Stream

    • OpenSUSE 15

    • Debian 10

    • Ubuntu 20.04 LTS

    • Ubuntu 22.04 LTS

  • FreeBSD

    • FreeBSD 13.2

    • FreeBSD 14.0

The Exasol ODBC driver needs at least OpenSSL 1.1 to run. On some operating systems, OpenSSL must be installed separately.

Download and install the ODBC driver

  1. Download the latest driver for your operating system from the Exasol Download Portal.

  2. Run the following commands to extract the package in a directory:
    • For Linux/FreeBSD: tar -xzf Exasol_ODBC-<version>.tar.gz
    • For Solaris: gtar -xzf Exasol_ODBC-<version>.tar.gz

For configuration information, see the readme.txt file included in the driver package.

License

Each driver package includes the latest version of the license for the driver. The license allows you to bundle the driver with third-party software, for example when creating plugins for a BI tool. For more details, refer to the license file which is located in the folder where the driver was installed.

Configure ODBC driver and data sources

To configure the driver, run the config_odbc program to generate the odbc.ini file. Change into the install directory and then run config_odbc as shown below: 

cd  Exasol_ODBC-*
        ./config_odbc

Running the config_odbc performs the following operations: 

  • Scan the system for available ODBC driver manager
  • Check for missing (3rd party) packages
  • Create an odbc.ini config file
  • Create a wrapper script to start applications
  • Test the database connectivity
  • Suggest the correct DSN an application needs based on the driver manager it uses

The generated odbc.ini file contains DSN entries for all supported ODBC driver managers. To further configure the options in the odbc.ini file, see Connection strings.

The config_odbc program also allows non-interactive use. For details, run the following command: 

./config_odbc --help

Known Issues

Issue Reason Solution
config_odbc does not start The operating system may not have the full Perl installation.

Install a full Perl system and try again.

Fix: minimal Debian

apt-get install perl

Fix: minimal CentOS 7

yum install perl-Digest-MD5

Error "Data source name not found, and no default driver specified"

Wrong version of the unixODBC is used because of multiple installation instances.

Specify the correct version of the unixODBC through
isql -version.
The unixODBC driver manager is using the wrong odbc.ini file.

Specify the correct odbc.ini file through the environment variable ODBCINI.

Error "Invalid UTF-8 character in input"

Wrong locale defined in the LC_ALL variable.

Define a locale in the LC_ALL variable that can display the characters properly.

Missing or wrong characters in output of console or your ODBC application

Incompatible locale defined in the odbc.ini file.

Set the environment variables LC_CTYPE and LC_NUMERIC or the parameters CONNECTIONLCCTYPE and CONNECTIONLCNUMERIC in the odbc.ini file to a locale that can display the characters.

Applications using the DataDirect driver manager need UTF-8 locales.