IBM OLE DB Provider for DB2

The IBM® OLE DB Provider for DB2® allows DB2 to act as a resource manager for the OLE DB provider. This support gives OLE DB-based applications the ability to extract or query DB2 data using the OLE interface.

Microsoft OLE DB is a set of OLE/COM interfaces that provides applications with uniform access to data stored in diverse information sources. The OLE DB architecture defines OLE DB consumers and OLE DB providers. An OLE DB consumer is any system or application that uses OLE DB interfaces; an OLE DB provider is a component that exposes OLE DB interfaces.

The IBM OLE DB Provider for DB2, whose provider name is IBMDADB2, enables OLE DB consumers to access data on a DB2 database server. If DB2 Connect™ is installed, these OLE DB consumers can also access data on a host DBMS such as DB2 for z/OS®, DB2 Server for VM and VSE, or DB2 Universal Database™ for AS/400®.

The IBM OLE DB Provider for DB2 offers the following features:

• Support level 0 of the OLE DB provider specification, including some additional level 1 interfaces.
• A free threaded provider implementation, which enables the application to create components in one thread and use those components in any other thread.
• An Error Lookup Service that returns DB2 error messages.

Note that the IBM OLE DB Provider resides on the client and is different from the OLE DB table functions, which are also supported by DB2 database systems.

Subsequent sections of this document describe the specific implementation of the IBM OLE DB Provider for DB2. For more information about the Microsoft OLE DB 2.0 specification, refer to the Microsoft OLE DB 2.0 Programmer's Reference and Data Access SDK, available from Microsoft Press.