Extending the Data Warehouse: An Introduction to OLE DB

S David Rlba, JADE Tech Inc CleaNlater, FL INTRODUCTION

In 1995, I first presented ODBC: Windows to the Outside World, an introduction to the topiC of Open DataBase Connectivity and how to use it effectively. Since then, ODBC has become a useful tool for many SAS sites for cross application access to data. ABSTRACT However, OOBC has its limitations. To address these limitations, and to provide a more flexible Now that you have your data warehoused, how do means of access to many different types of data, you share that infonnation with others who need Microsoft proposed a new standard for data access access to it? SA~ software provides a variety of technology, OLE DB. tools to access and retrieve data from multidimensional databases (MDDBs). However, At SUGI 24, Thomas Cox presented What's Up with MDDBs are not accessible to non-SAS users in your OLE DB?, which provides an excellent overview of organization. Until now. Starting with Version 7 of OLE DB architecture and concepts. This paper will the SAS System, OLE DB can be used to access attempt to provide some additional background on the infonnation stored in SAS MDDBs and eFO OLE DB, and present some techniques for using Vision FOBs. OLE DB to access both SAS and non-SAS data.

OLE DB can be used to access the infonnation WHAT IS WRONG WITH ODSC? stored in ANY multidimensional database that is OLE DB compliant. Starting with the release of ODBe was originally proposed by Microsoft in the Windows 2000 Professional, OLE DB will be early 1990's to solve the problem of accessing installed as part of the operating system. In relational and tabular data on the Microsoft Microsoft Office 2000, all member applications will Windows!!) platfonn. It subsequently was ported to be OLE DB consumers. The same is true for Lotus other platfonns and is now a universal method to SmartSulte member applications. Thus, any OLE share data between non-compatible applications on DB compliant consumer (such as Microsoft Excel, a wide variety of hardware platfonns. Lotus 1-2-3, Knosys ProClarity, and many others) will be able to directly query a SAS MDDB file using The ODBe architecture consisted of four tiers: OLE DB on all major platfonns, including Windows NT, UNIX, and mainframes. { ODBC Driver Manager { ODBe Drivers { Applications This paper will provide an introduction to OLE DB. It { Data Sources defined to ODse will describe OLE DB and how it works. The SAS implementation of OLE DB will be demonstrated, The OOBC Driver Manager is typically supplied by along with other OLE DB consumers such as the operating system vendor (e.g. Microsoft). Microsoft Excel and Lotus 1-2-3. The paper is intended as a beginning paper for the advanced OOBC Drivers are typically supplied by the vendor of user. a specific type of data to be accessed with ODBC (e.g. Oracle, SAS, Lotus, etc.).

Data Sources are defined by the end user to identify a speCific type of data to be read or written. However, there are several limitations that affect the use of ODBC. These limitations include:

15 { OOSC uses Sal as the common components, which process and transport data language (for example, query processors and cursor { ODBC Olivers are written to different engines). These components are designed to levels integrate smoothly to help OLE OS component { Oeployment issues vendors quickly bling high-quality OLE OS components to market. OLE OS includes a Since OOSC is based on Sal as the common bridge to OOSC to enable continued support for language for communicating between different types the broad range of OOSC relational database of data, the structure of Sal limits the types of data drivers available today. that can be accessed. Sal is best at accessing relational and tabular data. Sal can not be used OLE DB is intended to be an open standard capable effectively to access hierarchical, multi-dimensional of providing access to any type of data. As such, (MOOS), and free-form data. In addition, there are OLE DB will be useful for: many different interpretations of the SQl language, with differing levels of conformance to the Sal { Relational Data specifications. This can cause problems when trying { MultiDimensional Data (MODS) to construct a Sal query for OOSC. { Non-Relational Data { E-Mail OOSC Olivers are individual OlLs written by { Web Data different software vendors to support their specific { Oirectory Services data structures. However, the OOBC standard { IMS and VSAM data specifies several different levels of OOBC compliance, Core, level 1, and level 2. .Each Since OLE DB is an object oriented interface to OOBC dliver is written to one of these compliance data it is intended for use in thin client (web based) levels based on the features that they support. envi;onments. With OLE DB many different types of data can be accessed in a common manner using Oeployment of OOSC has been a problem at many web browsers, database software, stand alone sites. In order for OOSC to function properly, the applications, etc. server operating system, network transport, client softwa~e, and drivers must all be compatible. If this does not happen, troubleshooting OOBC problems IS OOBC OBSOLETE? can be extremely difficult. In many respects, OLE DB can be considered a superset to OoBC. OLE DB incluC!es all of the WHAT IS OLE DB? functionality of OOBC, adds additional functionality, and is easier to use. In fact, OLE OB ships with an In the Summer of 1996, Microsoft published the first OOBC Provider (more on this later). Thus, OLE DB specifications for OLE OB (Object Unking and can perform all of the functionality previously Embedding for DataBases). OLE OB was intended performed by OOBC, with the additional capabilities to overcome the limitations that had become built into OLE DB. apparent in OOSC. However, OLE DB is not intended to replace OOBC. According to Microsoft: The OOBC technology has matured and is widely used. OOBe is still the best choice when accessing OLE OB is an open specification designed to standard relational databases from a non-OLE build on the success of OOSC by providing an environment. OLE DB is still an evolving standard. open standard for accessing all kinds of data It is important to realize that Microsoft is fully throughout the enterprise. OLE OS is a core integrating OLE DB Into its product line (operating technology supporting universal data access. systems and Office suite) as their solution for Whereas oose was created to access relational universal data access. In addition, other vendors databases, OLE OS is designed for the relational such as SAS Institute are adopting OLE DB as a and nonrelational information sources, such as standard for extemal data access. mail stores, text and graphical data for the Web, directory services, and 'IMS and VSAM data In deciding whether to use OoBe or OLE DB, here stored in the mainframe. OLE OB components are some recommendations: consist of data providers, which expose data; data consumers, which use data; and service

16 { Use ODBC to access standaro relational OLE DB for DATA MINING databases from a non-OLE environment { Use OLE DB for non-SQl data In February, 2000, Microsoft updated a draft of a { Use OLE DB in an OLE environment specification for OLE DB for Data Mining. The { OLE DB is the only option for building specification is currently at Version 0.9. In interoperable database components (COM) cooperation with over 40 vendors in the business intelligence field, the OLE DB for OM specification defines a common interface for data mining UNDERSTANDING OLE DB applications. The goal of this specification is to provide an industry standaro for data mining so that Technologically, there is a fundamental difference in different data mining algorithms from various data the architectures of OOBC and OLE DB. mining vendors can be easily plugged into user applications. { ODBC is a procedural based specification OLE DB for OM specifies the API between data { OLE DB is a component based mining consumers and data mining providers. The specification specification does not add any new OLE DB { OOBC is designed to provide access interfaces. Instead, the specification defines a primarily to relational data using SQl in a simple query language similar to SQl syntax and multiplatfonn environment. specialized schema rowsets so consumer { OLE DB is designed to provide access to applications can communicate with data mining all types of data in an OLE Component providers. Object Model (COM) environment. like OLE DB, this area is still evolving and maturing. OLE DB includes the Structured Query language The OLE DB for OM speCification is currently in (SQl) functionality defined in OOBC, but it also public beta. However, the potential benefits from defines interfaces suitable for gaining access to data OLE DB for Data Mining are significant. other than SQl data. OLE DB Is intended to be an open standard capable of providing access to any type of data. In addition, OLE DB for OLAP (OnUne PROVIDERS AND CONSUMERS Analytical Processing) is Intended to extend the features of OLE DB to OLAP data. OLE DB introduces two new terms to the computer lexicon - ·provider" and ·consumer". These tenns Microsoft intended OLE DB to be the foundation of refer to the application software and how they their Universal Data Access strategy. To accomplish interact with OLE DB. this, OLE DB is tightly coupled with ADO (ActiveX Data Objects). ADO is the application level interface { Providers are applications that implement (API) that provides the Component Object Model OLE DB interfaces (COM) objects. Specifically, OLE DB is intended to { Consumers are applications that request be an object oriented solution for data access. COM (Component Object Models) is Microsoft's solution an OLE DB interface for object oriented programming. Virtually all of the The OLE DB specifications define four categories: Windows oriented environments (Visual Basic, Visual C++, Delphi, PowerBuilder, etc.) all support COM components. While Visual Basic originally { Data Providers created VBX files, COM files have the extension of { Data Consumers OCX (OLE Custom Control). OLE DB uses ADO { Data Service Providers (ActiveX Data Objects) which are COM cOmpliant { Business Component Developers objects that are designed for data access. An OLE DB Provider implements OLE DB interfaces. Thus, OLE DB is the interface to various types of Microsoft Windows 2000, Windows NT, and the SAS data, which uses ADO object oriented components local Data Provider are all OLE DB providers. to access the data. This is a very superficial view, Other OLE DB provider applications include and the reader is encouraged to research ADO and Microsoft SQl Server, DB2, AS400, Oracle, Red COM in more detail for a better understanding of Brick, Sybase, lotus Notes, and Microsoft how they interrelate. Exchange. OLE DB providers allow consumers to access data in a unifonn way through a known set of documented interfaces. In a sense, an OLE DB

17 provider Is similar to an OOBC driver that provides a applications must communicate with the OLE DB uniform mechanism for accessing relational data. objects. This Is done by means of program code OLE DB providers not only provide a mechanism for written in one of the object oriented programming relational data but also for non relational types of languages. Visual BaSiC, Visual C++, VB Script, and data. Java are among the languages that support OLE DB. The syntax of each of these languages needed OLE DB Consumers use, or consume, OLE DB to . communicate with the OLE DB objects are interfaces. Any application that connects to a beyond the scope of this paper. Any application that database using OLE DB is a consumer application. supports OLE DB as a consumer has a scripting Many applications are already OLE DB consumers. language that can be used to communicate with the Microsoft Office 2000, Lotus Notes, and SAs/Access OLE DB objects. to OLE DB are all examples of OLE DB consumers. Appendix A to this paper is a sample of HTML which The other two categories, Data Service Providers uses VB Script to read a SAS dataset from within a and Business Component Developers, are web page. The VB Script invokes the SAS Local concemed with building and deploying OLE DB Data Provider to open and read a SAS dataset components and will not be discussed in this paper. without the need to open SAS software in the background. This VB Script could be generalized to use any OLE DB provider as a variable, instead of THE ODBC PROVIDER FOR OLE DB hard coding the value in the script. The key here is that an HTML page, irrespective of operating system OLE DB ships with an OOBC Provider. The OOBC or location, can now access and retrieve data across Provider maps OLE DB interfaces to OOBC APls. a thin client. With the OOBC Provider, OLE DB consumers can connect to a database server through the existing . OOBC drivers as follows: SAS INTERFACES TO OLE DB

{ Consumers call an OLE DB interface on As part of the Nashville Project, SAS Institute is in the OOBC Provider the process of implementing support for OLE DB. { The OOBC Provider invokes The current Initiatives are: corresponding OOBC APls { The OOBC Provider sends the requests { SAS/Access to OLE DB to an OOBC driver { OLE DB for OLAP { Responses are retumed to the OLE DB { SAS .Local Data Provider consumer { SAS/Share Data Provider { SAS 10M Data Provider Because the OOBC Provider allows OLE DB { SAS SPO Server Data Provider consumers to use existing OOBC drivers, there may be some performance concems about the additional The status of each of these initiatives is listed as of layer of the OOBC Provider on top of the existing April,2000. OOBC driver manager. The design goal of the OOBC Provider is to implement all the functionality SAS/Access to OLE DB is production effective with of the OOBC driver manager. Thus, the OOBC Version 8.0. OLE DB for OLAP is a pass-through Driver Manger Is not needed. However, the OOBC component of SAs/Access to OLE DB. It is also Provider still requires the OOBC Driver Manager to production in Version 8.0. SASIMOOB server and support connection pooling with OOBC applications. CFO Vision Release 2.2 both have OLE DB for OLAP compliant interfaces.

The SAS Local Data Provider was formerty named the SAS OLE DB BaseProvider. It is experimental in Version 8.0. The role of the SAS Local Data Provider is to provide access to local SAS datasets CONSUMER INTERFACES TO OLE DB from non-SAS applications on the same machine.

Since OLE DB is Intended as an object oriented The SAS/Share Data Provider was formerly named interface to many different types of data, consumer the SAs/Share OLE DB Provider. It is experimental in Version 8.0. It is intended to provide access to

18 non-local SAS datasets managed by a SAS/Share server. It can surface any data that SAS can process.

The SAS 10M Server OLE DB Provider has been renamed to the SAS 10M Data Provider. It is currently considered Developers Release. It will be production in the Version 8.0 Maintenance Release. SAS Integration Technologies use the 10M Server to provide access to OLE DB data managed by the Integration Technologies object server. Microtoft OLE D9 PtoYide,Ior O,ade Microtoft OLE D9 Provider lor SOL Serve, Microsolt OLE DB Siq,/e Provider The SAS SPD Server has an ODBC interface and MS Remotll would be accessible using the ODBC Provider for MSDataSMpe OLE DB. It is due out later this year. SAS 10M Oala P,ovida SAS Local Data PtoYide,

SAS/ACCESS TO OLE DB

SASlAccess to OLE DB is a separately licensed product from SAS Institute. Like the other SASlAccess products, SAS/Access to OLE DB .provides an interface between the SAS System and OLE DB compliant data. The programming syntax is similar to that already used by the other SAS/Access products.

WIth SAS/Access to OLE DB, SAS has introduced a library engine, the OLEDB engine. Libraries using the OLEDB engine can be defined either with SAS program statements or vnth the new Library WIZard.

Defining a library containing OLE DB compliant data, can be as simple as:

LlBNAME UbrefOLEDB j Altematively, the user can complete all of the required data, such as: SAS will then prompt the user to define the rest of the information necessary. A popup window is LlBNAME UbrefOLEDB presented to define the properties of the data link. PROVIDER. 'oledb"'provlder' The popup window contains three tabs where the PROPERTIES = Properties, Connection, and Advanced features can ( "userid" usedd be The fourth tab, All, displays the initialization = set. password = JOOOOOC properties that have been defined for the data. "data source" = dsname) j

The details of configuring an OLE DB connection are beyond the scope of this paper. However, the SAS Version 8 Online Docs contained a very complete deSCription of the specific process required to define OLE DB data to SAS.

Since SAS/Access to OLE DB functions the same as all ofthe other SASlAccess products, the same SQL syntax is valid for OLE DB data. The SQL

19 Procedure Pass Through Facility is common across all of the SAB/Access product line. For more information about JADE Tech, Inc visit our website at For example, a Microsoft Access table can be opened in BAS using the Microsoft Jet OLE DB http:ltwww.jadetek.com Engine as follows:

PROC SQL feedback; AUTHOR CONNECT to OLEOS ( PROVIDER - "Microsoft.Jet.OLEDS.4.0" The author may be contacted at: PROPERTIES- S. David Riba ("data source" =" ds_name II )) ; CREATE TABLE sugi as SELECT A from COr,lNECTION TO oIedb JADE Tech, Inc. (select • from table_name) ; PO Box 4517 QUIT; Clearwater, FL 33758 (727) 726-6099 Each OLE DB Provider must be defined to the INTERNET: [email protected] system. The Data Unk Properties popup will identify each of the Providers available. However, to use the Provider with the SQL Pass Through Facility, the REFERENCES proper Provider 10 must be used. Cox, Thomas W. (1999). What's Up with OLE DB? Proceedings of the Twenty-Fourth Annual SAS CONCLUSION Users Group' International Conference. BAS Institute, Inc., Cary, NC. Pp.808-817

OLE DB is an emerging standard which will provide Maata, B., Alam, M., Maartens, G., McRoberts, R., a common means of accessing many different types Pelie, C., and Shanna, P. (1998). Fast Path to of infonnation. Through the use of object oriented ASl400 C/ientlServer Using ASl400 OleDB Support. programming languages such as Visual Basic, IBM Corp. Visual C++, Java, or SAS software, OLE DB data objects can be accessed from almost any Microsoft Corp, Microsoft OLE DB online library application. OLE DB Is particularly useful with thin client applications, such as web browsers, and with Microsoft Corp, (2000) OLE DB for Data Mining complex data such as multi-climensional databases. DRAFT Specification, Version 0.9. As database vendors implement OLE DB support in their products, the inherent capabURies of OLE DB SAS institute, Inc. SAS OnLine Docs will become apparent to anyone who needs the abilRy to access and exchange intonnation between many different types of applications. AUTHORBIO

TRADEMARK INFORMATION S. David Ribs Is CEO of JADE Tech, Inc., a SAS Institute Quality Partner who specializes entirely in applications development, consulting and training in SAS is a registered trademark of SAS Institute Inc. in the the SAS System. Dave has presented papers and USA and other countries. • indicates USA registration. aSSisted in various capacities at SUGI, SESUG, NESUG, MWSUG, SCBUG, and PhannaSUG. other products mentioned are trademarks or service marks of their respective owners. His major areas of interest are efficient programming techniques and applications development using the ABOUT JADE Tech, Inc. SAS System. His SAS software product specialties are SAS/AF and FRAME technology, SASIEIS,

20 SASllntrNet, AppDev Studio, CFONision, and the SAS Collaborative Server. Dave is a SAS Certified Professional.

Dave is currently the Co-Chair of SSU 2001, the combined SouthEast and SouthCentral SAS Users Group conference to be held in New Orteans in August, 2001.

21 APPENDIX A Sample HTML to access SAS data using OLE DB