The SQLB project is used to improve SQL requests to a database. It supports MySQL, PostgreSQL and Oracle(tm).
It is a set of deamon programs that make multiple permanent connection to one or more database when they start. Then an external program, previously linked with the sqlb client library, can send SQL requests to these deamons and get the result without any need to make a connection/disconnection. The SQLB PHP and Perl modules provided here with SQLB are some examples of such programs.
The requests are improve thanks to the permanent connection system. For each requests, you win the time that will be used to make the connection and disconnection. But the improvement has its limits, of course. According to the kind of database used and the manner you access it, the improvement differ. In fact, SQLB is most efficient in two cases :

• When you use a database that have complex connection protocol like Oracle.


• When your database is on a distant server.

With database like MySQL or PostgreSQL hosted in the same server, SQLB bring no improvement because it uses unix sockets like them. But if you hosts the databases on a distant servers, you can have quite the same results as if you have a local base. So it's a good solution when multiple servers must access a centralized database.

Features:

• Support of MySQL, PostgreSQL and Oracle(tm) database.


• Definition of multiple connection pool to one or more database of any kind (mixing is possible). An id allow you to choose which access to use later.


• Possibility of load management : SQLB is able to create or stop new connections to deal with an increasing number of requests


• Possibility to add integrity check : SQLB will regularly check if the queued requests aren't corrupted because they are stored in a shared memory segment


• Permanent connection check : SQLB will regurlarly check if its database connection are alive, and in the contrary reconnect them.


• Logging system : Logging is managed by one of the SQLB deamon. You have four different level of log ; you can log errors, useful informations, SQL requests executed and debug messages


• Very simple API : the API consists of only one function. All the resulted informations are stored in a structure. Don't be bother with all complex API anymore (connect, prepare, execute, fetch, ... ;)


• You can easily migrate from a database type to another without deeply modifying your code, just some adjustment has to be made in the SQL requests to deal with the database specificities. And with the PHP and Perl module, you can start a web site with a free database like MySQL or PostgreSQL and then migrate easily to Oracle if your site become too important to continue working correctly with these free databases (that are very good databases but in certain cases could reach their limits ;)


• Timeout management : the client library manages timeout so that your external program won't freeze if the database don't answer properly.