[freetds] SQL Server 2005 / 2008 support

Sebastien FLAESCH sf at 4js.com
Thu Dec 13 11:16:09 EST 2007


Hi James and thank you for your comments/advices.

I understand this is a open source project, no problem.

I will try to get the latest dev version from the CVS repository.

As a side note I would suggest that someone adds from time to time a news
on the web site, last news is from April 2005. By the way the text of the
new shows 0.63, but the link to the ANNOUNCE has 0.64 in the text.

Best regards.
Seb

James K. Lowden wrote:
> Sebastien FLAESCH wrote:
>> My name is Sebastien FLAESCH 
> 
> Good morning, Sebastien.  Pleased to make your acquaintance.  Welcome to
> the project.  
> 
>> Understand we do not just write a light driver to let 4gl programmers do
>> a few SELECT / INSERT / UPDATE / DELETE statements;
> 
> FreeTDS is used extensively in many production environments, be assured.  
> 
>> - Version is still alpha/beta (0.64) - when you compile FreeTDS you get
>> a debug version by default. - No scrollable cursors??? (this is very old
>> stuff - now?)
>>
>> PLEASE: What are the plans?
> 
> There is no plan.  When and as we have time, we fix things and add things.
>  You're welcome to join us.  It's a volunteer project, and the best
> contributions come from people who want the software to do something it
> doesn't already do.  
> 
>> - There is no official support for SQL Server 2005 / 2008 (only TDS 8.0)
> 
> And guess what?  There's no official support, full stop.  Everything we
> know about TDS 7.0 and up is inferred by reverse engineering the TDS
> packets.  (The only support we get from Microsoft is anti-support.  We've
> talked to them.  They won't provide even documentation.  The next time you
> read about Microsoft's latest open source marketing blather initiative, do
> please bear that simple fact in mind.)  
> 
> To be clear, we're pretty current.  TDS 8.0 *is* for 2005, and 2008 is
> still in beta, please.  Is there some protocol feature of SQL Server 2005
> that you noticed is missing?  
> 
>> You guys probably know about SQL Server's Native Client that ships with
>> SQL Server 9 (2005). This one is supposed to replace the old ODBC driver
>> one day, from my understanding. Are they still using TDS with this
>> Native Client? => Is TDS going to die?
> 
> Cf. http://blogs.msdn.com/dataaccess/archive/2005/04/26/412161.aspx
> 
> Every few years, Microsoft plops a New and Improved API out there for
> everyone to ooh and ahh at.  That lets them and their groupies declare
> they've once again made the world safe for programming.  
> 
> But TDS itself is a franchise.  It's 20 years old.  It works with probably
> millions of clients and servers. It's very efficient, possibly the best
> remote database protocol on the planet.  (Yes, it has warts.  Show me
> software without warts and I'll show you a textbook.)  How in the world --
> and why? -- would Microsoft damage its advantage?  It's one thing to say,
> "Use .NET and be cool", and something else to say that old clients can't
> connect to new servers or vice versa.  Especially because *TDS* isn't a
> feature most people even know about, and would be devilishly hard to
> improve on.  
> 
> As Acey J. Bunch says above, 
> 
> 	"It is new in that this data access library did not exist prior to SQL
> Server 2005, but rest assured that it is not some radical new design for
> accessing data!"
> 
> I think we can say TDS is safe for another day.  
> 
> Regarding the issues you raised.  As you can tell from Frediano's response
> (and I hope from the email archives) we take bug reports seriously.  But
> please remember we'll work with you, not for you.  The more you do to
> correct/isolate a problem, the sooner it will be fixed.  Suggestions,
> ordered by decreasing helpfulness:
> 
> 1.  Use the latest snapshot.  That's where any fixes/additions will be
> made. 
> 2.  Send a patch. 
> 3.  Add a unit test illustrating the problem.  
> 4.  Describe the problem in terms of the source code.  "Function X on
> lines Y-Z overwrites foo without adjusting the length in bar" can be a
> good place to start.  
> 5.  Include a TDSDUMP trace.  That shows us the packet sequence and
> calling sequence.  
> 
> Sebastien, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.  
> 
> Regards, 
> 
> --jkl
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