Reading data from a Microsoft Access 2003 database

[Adam Tauno Williams]

On Thu, 2010-05-20 at 22:58 -0700, Dennis Lee Bieber wrote:
> On Thu, 20 May 2010 02:45:10 -0700 (PDT), Jimoid
> <jimmy.cullen at gmail.com> declaimed the following in
> gmane.comp.python.general:
> > I've now had a closer look at both pyODBC and mxODBC and it seems to
> > me that they both require the database to be running to be able to
> > query it. Is this correct? If so I think I will have to use mdb-* as
> > the database I want to query is not running.
> To my knowledge, all "ODBC" modules (in any language) rely upon a
> DBMS specific driver.

Correct (of course, so does DB-API if you are using a 'native' Python
connection).

>  Where the DB-API definition defines the common
> Python side of a database interface, ODBC defines a common OS-level
> interface to the DBMS, using a named driver (driver specified in the
> connection string or, for Windows, externally with the connection string
> specifying the connection definition) 

There is no distinction between how ODBC operates on Windows or LINUX.
Both use the same connection strings [provided the drivers have the same
names].

> to translate ODBC calls into actual DBMS calls.

Yes, just like a DB-API provider, except that the 'translation' happens
in the ODBC driver.
-- 
Adam Tauno Williams <awilliam at whitemice.org> LPIC-1, Novell CLA
<http://www.whitemiceconsulting.com>
OpenGroupware, Cyrus IMAPd, Postfix, OpenLDAP, Samba