Is it possible to connect to a SQL Server via SAS without using ODBC?
If the answer is yes can you give a code example of how to do it?
OleDb. Those are your two choices. You could also use a web service to front the SQL Server db and use PROC HTTP or PROC SOAP (Preference would be REST/JSON). For direct access you need the SAS Access engine for SQL Server, ODBC, or OleDB.
Yes it is possible. You can do it either as libname or in proc sql. i suggest using insertbuff-option when uploading. Just make sure your username, passwords and server are not quoted, like in oleDb connections.
libname My_libname odbc noprompt =
"DRIVER=SQL Server; server=&server.; Uid=&userName.;Pwd=&password.; DATABASE=&Database.;"
INSERTBUFF=32767;
The second way is the
proc sql;
connect to odbc as my_conn
(noprompt = "DRIVER=SQL Server; server=&server; Uid=&user.; Pwd=&password.; DATABASE=&database.;");
create table Query_result as
select * from connection to my_conn (
select * from table_in_server_database
);
quit;
For more you can read in SAS support page
Whilst this technically uses ODBC/OLEDB, you don't need SAS licenced for it... write a VBScript (potentially receiving arguments passed from SAS) which connects to your data source using the system ODBC/OLEDB drivers, executes the query, and returns delimited records.
Then execute said VBScript via a pipe infile, read the records into SAS.
I do this regularly against multiple data sources (Informix, SQL Server, DB2, MSAccess/Excel).
I cannot comment on Chris J's answer but it is a cool idea. I would make some modifications (suggestions) to it. Skip VBScript since it is out of date and is not allowed in a lot of places. Use .NET Core/C# and Entity Framework. EF is a full ORM, easy to use, and will auto-magically discover the entire DB structure on almost every db out there. Stream the data back using a memory buffer.
Like Chris' answer but just updating it to more modern mechanisms. Will have to give it a try since it is a clever way around the issue.
Related
Apparently, using AttachDbFilename and user instance in your connection string is a bad way to connect to a DB. I'm using SQL server express on my local machine and it all seems to work fine. But what's the proper way to connect to SQL server then?
Thanks for your explanation.
Using User Instance means that SQL Server is creating a special copy of that database file for use by your program. If you have two different programs using that same connection string, they get two entirely different copies of the database. This leads to a lot of confusion, as people will test updating data with their program, then connect to a different copy of their database in Management Studio, and complain that their update isn't working. This sends them through a flawed series of wild goose chase steps trying to troubleshoot the wrong problem.
This article goes into more depth about how to use this feature, but heed the very first note: the User Instance feature has been deprecated. In SQL Server 2012, the preferred alternatives are (in this order, IMHO):
Create or attach your database to a real instance of SQL Server. Your connection string will then just need to specify the instance name, the database name, and credentials. There will be no mixup as Management Studio, Visual Studio and your program(s) will all be connecting to a single copy of the database.
Use a container for local development. Here's a great starter video by Anna Hoffman and Anthony Nocentino, and I have some other resources here, here, and here. If you're on an M1 Mac, you won't be able to use a full-blown SQL Server instance, but you can use Azure SQL Edge if you can get by with most SQL Server functionality (the omissions are enumerated here).
Use SqlLocalDb for local development. I believe I pointed you to this article yesterday: "Getting Started with SQL Server 2012 Express LocalDB."
Use SQL Server Compact. I like this option the least because the functionality and syntax is not the same - so it's not necessarily going to provide you with all the functionality you're ultimately going to want to deploy. Compact Edition is also deprecated, so there's that.
Of course if you are using a version < SQL Server 2012, SqlLocalDb is not an option - so you should be creating a real database and using that consistently. I only mention the Compact option for completeness - I think that can be almost as bad an idea as using AttachDbFileName.
EDIT: I've blogged about this here:
Bad Habits : Using AttachDBFileName
In case someone had the problem.
When attaching the database with a connection string containing AttachDBFile
with SQLEXPRESS, I noticed this connection was exclusive to the ASP.NET application that was using the database. The connection did block the access to all other processes on the file level when made with System.Data.SqlClient as provider.
In order to assure the connection to be shareable with other processes
instead use DataBase to specify the database name in your connection string
Example or connection string :
Data Source=.\SQLEXPRESS;DataBase=PlaCliGen;User ID=XXX;password=ZZZ; Connect Timeout=30
,where PlaCliGen is the name (or logical name) by which SQLEXPRESS server knows the database.
By connecting to the data base with AttachDBFile giving the path to the .mdf file
(namely : replacing DataBase = PlacliGen by AttachDBFile = c:\vs\placligen\app_data\placligen.mdf) the File was connected exclusively and no other process could connect to the database.
I have a big deal: I have to connect (I just want to read data, not to write) to my customer's IBM AS/400 (aka iSeries, now IBM i) server...
I think I have all parameters needed (given me by the AS/400 programmer), but I can't figure out which driver I have to use, and if I have all software needed to to this!
I've installed IBM AS/400 ClientAccess 5.8 driver (with a patch for latest OS), and now I'm trying to configure a new Linked Server in my Sql Server 2008 R2 (x64) server.
First problem: Which driver should I use?
I have so many choices (but maybe none of these works!!):
IBM DB2 UDB for iSeries IBMDASQL OLE DB Provider
IBM DB2 UDB for iSeries IBMDA400 OLE DB Provider
IBM DB2 UDB for iSeries IBMDARLA OLE DB Provider
...or maybe other generic OLEDB/ODBC drivers?!
Second problem: Where should I put my parameters (in which fields I mean!)
In any case, in I choose a provider for my Linked Server, obviously I have to set my parameters...but I only have this:
Username of an ADMIN user
Password of the ADMIN user
AS/400 server IP address
The name of "main" archive, in which my data are stored (something like ACG_DATV2)
Third problem: How should I write my queries? How to reference an AS/400 "archive" and tables?
I don't know how to build my reading query: where are tables and views (?!) stored and how can I reference them?
Thank you in advance!
I think there are many ways to achieve what you want, but I'll try to explain what I would do in your case.
With that version of IBM ClientAccess (and also the patch), I should not have troubles in getting connected with a Sql Server 2008 R2 Linked Server if you use the correct data provider.
First of all, try to configure your linked server in this way:
Linked server name: what you want, it's just a custom name (example: MYAS400)
Provider: IBM DB2 UDB for iSeries IBMDASQL OLE DB Provider
Product name: not important, something like iSeries Access OLEDB Driver
Data source: AS/400 server IP address (example: 192.168.0.1)
Either if you configure the Linked Server using the wizard or by SQL code, the first time it will need to access the data of the AS/400 server, you'll be asked for credentials, with a typical iSeries window (look at my example).
Set your username (User ID) and the relative password, without regarding the case of the strings!!
As a general tip (but this is only related to my experience!), try to avoid special characters and upper/lower cases distinctions...
If you arrive here (no problems in the Linked Server creation), the Linked Server should work (so the first and the second problem are solved): let's build the first query!
Once the Linked Server is created, all you need is just to correctly reference the archive, the library and, of course, the correct table and the Linked Server (by name): with this informations, build a query like this (it's the usual T-SQL syntax):
SELECT
(Field1)
, (Field2)
, *
FROM (Linked Server Name).(Catalog Name).(Library).(TableName)
The only information you're probably missing is the "archive": you can easily find it browsing the Catalogs tree inside your new Linked Server, or just use iSeries Access Navigator tool!
So, in your case, I think the query should be (more or less):
SELECT
FILIO
, DTVLD
, DTVLA
, SEQZA
, CFIMP
, PADRE
, TPVLD
, CMVLD
, *
FROM MYAS400.S242DA0A.ACG_DATV2.ANLE200F
Note that S242DA0A is valid only in my case...
Remember also that:
AS/400 will probably ask you for credentials very often: also if you close and reopen SSMS.
Performance?...better to talk of something else :) ... extract the tables in your Sql Server tables and query them from there! Do it with a simple: SELECT (Fields) INTO myTable FROM (AS/400 table)
I've tried this process many times, I didn't have many troubles (once I get skilled about!)...but only for reading data (as you asked)! Never tried to update data!!!
GOOD LUCK!
Can I use OPENDATASOURCE (or another mechanism) from a Stored Procedure to connect to the same database as a different user? If so, how?
The database is meant to be deployed to several customers, and replicated by them as many times as they want to, etc. For this reason, I CANNOT HARDCODE the database server's name or the database's name.
(I tried using OPENDATASOURCE, but it only accepts hardcoded connection strings.)
Might EXECUTE AS work in your situation? http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms181362.aspx
You can set up a Linked Server to connect to the remote server using the login's current security context (or other options as it applies to your situation).
From your stored procedure, you could access it with something like SELECT * FROM mylinkedservername.mylinkedserverdatabase.dbo.mytable
But you say you want to connect to the same database but using a different login? You're looking for impersonation. Perhaps you can do this making a Linked Server that references itself, I haven't tried it. Search Microsoft Help documentation for how to set it up normally and test if it does what you're looking to do.
This is probably going to be an underspecified question, as I'm not looking for a specific fix:
I want to run a machine learning algorithm on some data in a SQL Server database. I'd like to use R to do the calculations -- which would involve using R to connect to the database, process the data, and write a table of results back to the database.
Is this possible? My guess is yes. Shouldn't be a problem using a client...
however, would it be possible to set this up on a linux box as a cron job?
Yes to all!
Your choices for scripting are either Rscript or littler as discussed in this previous post.
Having struggled with connecting to MSSQL databases from Linux, my recommendation is to use RJDBC for database connections to MSSQL. I used RODBC to connect from Windows but I was never able to get it working properly in Linux. To get RJDBC working you will need to have Java installed properly on your Linux box and may need to change some environment variables (seems I always have SOMETHING mis-configured with rJava). You will also need to download and install the JDBC drivers for Linux which you can get directly from Microsoft.
Once you get RJDBC installed and the drivers installed, the code for pulling data from the database will look something like the following template:
require(RJDBC)
drv <- JDBC("com.microsoft.sqlserver.jdbc.SQLServerDriver",
"/etc/sqljdbc_2.0/sqljdbc4.jar")
conn <- dbConnect(drv, "jdbc:sqlserver://mySqlServer", "userId", "Password")
sqlText <- paste("
SELECT *
FROM SomeTable
;")
myData <- dbGetQuery(conn, sqlText)
You can write a table with something like
dbWriteTable(conn, "myData", SomeTable, overwrite=TRUE)
When I do updates to my DB I generally use dbWriteTable() to create a temporary table on my database server then I issue a dbSendUpdate() that appends the temp table to my main table then a second dbSendUpdate() that drops the temporary table. You might find that pattern useful.
The only "gotcha" I ran into was that I could never get a Windows domain/username to work in the connection sequence. I had to set up an individual SQL Server account (like sa).
You may just write a script containing R code and put this in the first line:
#!/usr/bin/env Rscript
change the file permissions to allow execution and put in crontab as it would be a bash script.
We have a classic ASP application that simply works and we have been loathe to modify the code lest we invoke the wrath of some long-dead Greek gods.
We recently had the requirement to add a feature to an application. The feature implementation is really just a database operation requires minimal change to the UI.
I changed the UI and made the minor modification to submit a new data value to the sproc call (sproc1).
In sproc1 that is called directly from ASP, we added a new call to another sproc that happens to be located on another server, sproc2.
Somehow, this does not work via our ASP app, but works in SQL Management Studio.
Here's the technical details:
SQL 2005 on both database servers.
Sql Login is authenticating from the ASP application to SQL 2005 Server 1.
Linked server from Server 1 to Server 2 is working.
When executing sproc1 from SQL Management Studio - works fine. Even when credentialed as the same user our code uses (the application sql login).
sproc2 works when called independently of sproc1 from SQL Management Studio.
VBScript (ASP) captures an error which is emitted in the XML back to the client. Error number is 0, error description is blank. Both from the ADODB.Connection object and from whatever Err.Number/Err.Description yields in VBScript from the ASP side.
So without any errors, nor any reproducibility (i.e. through SQL Mgmt Studio) - does anyone know the issue?
Our current plan is to break down and dig into the code on the ASP side and make a completely separate call to Server 2.sproc2 directly from ASP rather than trying to piggy-back through sproc1.
Have you got set nocount on set in both stored procedures? I had a similar issue once and whilst I can't remember exactly how I solved it at the moment, I know that had something to do with it!
You could be suffering from the double-hop problem
The double-hop issue is when the ASP/X page tries to use resources that are located on a server that is different from the IIS server.
Windows NT Challenge/Response does not support double-hop impersonations (in that once passed to the IIS server, the same credentials cannot be passed to a back-end server for authentication).
You should verify the attempted second connection using SQL Profiler.
Note that with your manual testing you are not authenticating via IIS. It's only when you initiate the sql via the ASP/X page that this problem manifests.
More resources:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/910449
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/891031
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/810572
I had a similar problem and I solved it by setting nocount on and removing print commands.
My first reaction is that this might not be an issue of calling cross-server, but one of calling a second proc from a first, and that this might be what's acting differently in the two different environments.
My first question is this: what happens if you remove the cross-server aspect from the equation? If you could set up a test system where your first proc calls your second proc, but the second proc is on the same server and/or in the same database, do you still get the same problem?
Along these same lines: In my experience, when the application and SSMS have gotten different results like that, it has often been an issue of the stored procedures' settings. It could be, as Luke says, NOCOUNT. I've had this sort of thing happen from extraneous PRINT statements in the code, although I seem to remember the PRINTed value becoming part of the error description (very counterintuitively).
If anything is returned in the Messages window when you run this in SSMS, find out where it is coming from and make it stop. I would have to look up the technical terms, but my recollection is that different querying environments have different sensitivities to "errors", and that a default connection via SSSM will not throw an error at certain times when an ADO connection from a scripting language will.
One final thought: in case it is an environment thing, try different settings on your ASP page's connection string. E.g., if you have an OLEDB connection, try ODBC. Try the native and non-native SQL Server drivers. Check out what connection string options your provider supports, and try any of them that seem like they might be worth trying.
Example code might help :) Are you trying to return two tables from the stored procedure; I don't think ADO 2.6 can handle multiple tables being returned.
I did consider that (double-hop), but what is the difference between a sproc-in-a-sproc call like I am referring to vs. a typical cross-server join via INNER JOIN? Both would be executed on Server1, using the Linked Server credentials, and authenticating to Server 2.
Can anyone confirm that calling a sproc cross-server is different than doing a join on data tables? And why?
If the Linked Server config is a sql account - is that considered a double-hop (since what you refer to is NTLM double-hops?)
In terms of whether multiple resultsets are coming back - no. Both Server1.Sproc1 and Server2.Sproc2 would be "ExecuteNonQuery()" in the .net world and return nothing (no resultsets and no return values).
Try to check the permissions to the database for the user specified in the connection string.
Use the same user name in the connection string to log in to the database while using sql mgmt studio.
create some temporary table to write the intermediate values and exceptions since it can be a effective way of debugging your application.
Can I just check: You made the addition of sproc2? Prior to that it was working fine for ages.
Could you not change where you call sproc2 from? Rather than calling it from inside sproc1, can you call it from the ASP? That way you control the authentication to SQL in the code, and don't have to rely on setting up any trusts or shared remote authentication on the servers.
How is your linked server set up? You generally have some options as to how it authenticates to the remote server, which include logging in as the currently logged in user or specifying a SQL login to always use. Have you tried setting it to always use a specific account? That should eliminate any possible permissions issues in calling the remote procedure...