FreeBCP to SQL Azure complains table doesn't exist - sql-server

Question

$ freebcp DWSTAGE.BCPTEST in bcptest.txt -f cdr.fmt -S serverfromfreetds -U user#azureserver -P password
Msg 208, Level 16, State 1
Server 'azureserver', Line 1
Invalid object name 'DWSTAGE.BCPTEST'.
Msg 208, Level 16
General SQL Server error: Check messages from the SQL Server
Msg 20064, Level 2
Attempt to use Bulk Copy with a non-existent Server table
$ freebcp DATABASENAME.DWSTAGE.BCPTEST in bcptest.txt -f cdr.fmt -S serverfromfreetds -U user#azureserver -P password
Msg 40515, Level 15, State 1
Server 'azureserver', Line 16
Reference to database and/or server name in 'DATABASENAME.DWSTAGE.BCPTEST' is not supported in this version of SQL Server.
Msg 40515, Level 15
General SQL Server error: Check messages from the SQL Server
Msg 20064, Level 2
Attempt to use Bulk Copy with a non-existent Server table
I've also tried adding the database to the command line with the -D option. The default database for that connection is set up as this one and only Azure database in the freetds.conf.
The connection to SQL Azure seems fine otherwise - I just can't get FreeBCP to work:
$ isql serverfromfreetds user#azuredatabasename password
+---------------------------------------+
| Connected! |
| |
| sql-statement |
| help [tablename] |
| quit |
| |
+---------------------------------------+
SQL> SELECT COUNT(*) FROM DWSTAGE.BCPTEST;
+------------+
| |
+------------+
| 0 |
+------------+
SQLRowCount returns 1
1 rows fetched
SQL> SELECT COUNT(*) FROM DWSTAGE.BCPTESTX;
[ISQL]ERROR: Could not SQLExecute
SQL>
This seems like some database/schema confusion, but I can't find a combination of settings which works.

Answer 1

From the FreeTDS mailing list:
The message 208 comes from the server. A quick look at freebcp.c shows
argv[1] isn't parsed. It's copied to a struct and used verbatim e.g.
if (dbfcmd(dbproc, "SET FMTONLY ON select *
from %s SET FMTONLY OFF", pdata->dbobject) == FAIL)
My guess is that the account you're logging in with has a default
database, and that database is not the one containing DWSTAGE.BCPTEST.
The Azure server rejects dbname.schema.object syntax, and freebcp has
no -D option because until Azure every TDS server did accept that
syntax.
You could verify that using
$ freebcp 'select db_name()' queryout /dev/stdout ...
As a temporary workaround, I think this would work:
freebcp DWSTAGE.BCPTEST in bcptest.txt \
-O 'USE dbname' \
-f cdr.fmt -S serverfromfreetds -U user#azureserver -P password
A permanent fix would support -D.
Yes, that user's default database is probably master. There IS a
default database set up in the odbc config, but I was mistaken, there
is no such option in the freeetds.conf.
We've moved away from trying to get Linux to work for this process for
now, but I'll revisit this.
I expect that workaround will not work because USE isn't supported -
you do in fact have to connect directly to the database, because of
the nature of the SQL Azure architecture.
Yes, you're right. I forgot about that.
About a year ago we added the DBSETLDBNAME macro as a way to set the
dbname in the db-lib LOGINREC. That sets the dbname in the login
packet, obviating the need for "USE dbname". freebcp could be modified
to support that feature with a -D option.
See change
http://gitorious.org/freetds/freetds/commit/4a21ded022405693607e71938d0c6173816f5ff9/diffs/c34afafd2fec4cbba9b245e4f13a5471c6fb8041
(add support for -D in freebcp)

Answer 2

I have gotten freebcp working with Ubuntu 12.04 and Azure SQL. It follows on to the answer above where support for -D is mentioned.
First I started by installing and configuring freetds as described in this thread: https://askubuntu.com/questions/167491/connecting-ms-sql-using-freetds-and-unixodbc-isql-no-default-driver-specified
Basically, that consisted of:
sudo apt-get install tdsodbc unixodbc freetds-bin
That brought me to the point where this thread starts; freebcp could connect but I was getting the error about "Reference to database...not supported in this version of SQL server".
The next step is to note that the version of freebcp installed by apt-get is a quite old version. Instead download a more recent version from ftp://ftp.freetds.org/pub/freetds/stable/. I used freetds-1.00.9.tar.gz.
Install it using ./configure and make then use this new freebcp just the same but with -D.
Here is my command string: freetds-1.00/src/apps/freebcp bcptest in bcptest.big.dat -U myUserName#myServer -S MyServerConfig -P 'mypa$$word' -D myDatabase -c -e upload.err