Connect to Microsoft SQL Server (FireDAC)

Go Up to Database Connectivity (FireDAC)

This topic describes how to connect to Microsoft SQL Server.

Supported Versions

The FireDAC native driver supports Microsoft SQL Server Standard and Express editions version 2000 and later, and Microsoft SQL Azure. For a description of how to connect to Microsoft SQL Server Compact Edition, see Connect to Microsoft SQL Server Compact Edition.

Windows Client Software

FireDAC requires one of the Microsoft SQL Server x86 or x64 ODBC drivers to be installed on the workstation:

SQL Server ODBC driver as the connectivity for SQL Server 2000. Most likely, the ODBC driver is already installed on your workstation. If not, see details.
SQL Native Client as the connectivity for SQL Server 2000 and 2005. We strongly recommend that you have SQL Native Client installed, if your application has to work with SQL Server 2005. See Microsoft SQL Server Native Client.
SQL Server Native Client NN.N as the connectivity for SQL Server 2000, 2005, 2008, 2012, and SQL Azure. We strongly recommend that you have SQL Server Native Client NN.N installed, if your application has to work with SQL Server 2008, 2012, or SQL Azure. See Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Native Client.
SQL Server Native Client 11.0 as the connectivity for LocalDB.

Note: SQL Server Native Client 10.0 (SQL Server 2008) may fail to call a stored procedure, when it is connected to SQL Server 2000. The symptom of this issue is the error message "Incorrect Syntax near to {". In this case, use the ODBC driver from the SQL Server 2000 or 2005 distribution.

If the SQL Server ODBC driver has not been installed properly, an exception is raised when you try to connect:

[FireDAC][Phys][ODBC][Microsoft][ODBC Driver Manager] Data source name not found and no default driver specified

Mac OS X Client Software

FireDAC requires:

the UnixODBC (libodbc.dylib) x86 ODBC driver manager library.
the FreeTDS (libtdsodbc.so) x86 ODBC driver.

FreeTDS can be transferred from CVS into a folder in your home directory (more 1) (more 2). To install FreeTDS on Mac OS X, use the commands:

cvs -z3 -d:pserver:anonymous@freetds.cvs.sourceforge.net:/cvsroot/freetds checkout -P freetdsccd freetds./autogen.sh./configure --with-tdsver=8.0 --with-unixodbc=/usr/localmakesudo make installecho [FreeTDS] > tds.driver.templateecho Description=v0.82 with protocol v8.0 >> tds.driver.templateecho Driver=/usr/local/lib/libtdsodbc.so >> tds.driver.templateodbcinst -i -d -f tds.driver.template

Note that you may also need to install the gawk utility. At this point, you can configure a ODBC DSN or test the FireDAC connection.

Note that the FreeTDS ODBC driver is not that efficient and stable as the original Microsoft ODBC driver.

Driver Linkage

To link the driver:

drop a TFDPhysMSSQLDriverLink component from the "FireDAC Links" palette page
or include the FireDAC.Phys.MSSQL unit in the uses clause.

Connection Definition Parameters

To connect to the Microsoft SQL Server DBMS, most applications require you to specify DriverID, Server, Database, OSAuthent, User_Name, and Password.

DriverID=MSSQL

Parameter	Description	Example value
Server	Name of a server running SQL Server on the network. The value must be either the name of a server on the network or the name of a SQL Server Client Network Utility advanced server entry. When you connect to the SQL Azure, you have to prepend the server name with the "tcp:" prefix. Note: The alternative TPC/IP port may be specified after a server name, separated by the comma.	127.0.0.1\SQLEXPRESS SrvHost, 4000 tcp:nasdfert6.database.windows.net
Port	Only for Mac OS X. Specifies the port where the SQL Server is listening. For the Windows platform the port may be specified after a comma in the Server parameter value. For example, Server=host, port. The default port is 1433.
Database	Name of the default database for the connection. If the Database is not specified, the default database defined for the login is used.	Northwind
OSAuthent	Controls the authentication mode: Yes -- use Windows authentication. No -- use DBMS authentication. This is the default value.	No
User_Name	The SQL Server login name, if OSAuthent=No. When you connect to the SQL Azure, you have to append the "@<server>" suffix to your user name.	sa addemo@nasdfert6
Password	The SQL Server login password, if OSAuthent=No. Note that the passwords with both '{' and '}' are not supported.
Network	Name of a network library dynamic-link library. The name does not need to include the path and must not include the .dll file name extension.	dbnmpntw
Address	Network address of the server running an instance of SQL Server. Address is usually the network name of the server, but can be other names, such as a pipe, or a TCP/IP port and socket address.
MARS	Controls the MARS - multiple active result set support in a connection: Yes -- MARS is enabled for a connection. This is the default value. No -- MARS is disabled. MARS is a feature supported by SQL 2005 and later. It is not supported by SQL Azure. The enabled MARS may lead to fetch performance degradation. For more details, read the following: Using Multiple Active Result Sets (MARS)	No
Workstation	Workstation ID. Typically, this is the network name of the computer on which the application resides (optional). If specified, this value is stored in the master.dbo.sysprocesses column hostname and is returned by sp_who and the Transact-SQL HOST_NAME function.	Bookkeeper1
Language	SQL Server language name (optional). When connecting to a SQL Server with multiple languages, Language specifies which set of messages are used for the connection.
Encrypt	Controls the network traffic encryption: Yes -- network traffic is encrypted. No -- no encryption is used. This is the default value.	Yes
LoginTimeout	Controls the amount of time, in seconds, before an application times out while attempting to establish a connection. 0 specifies an infinite wait (default value).	30
VariantFormat	Controls the SQL_VARIANT data type representation: String -- values are represented as dtWideString. A string value is returned as a hex string, numbers as strings, and so on. This is the default value. Binary -- values are represented as dtByteString with raw data presentation. A string value is returned as a string with original encoding, numbers in binary format, and so on.	Binary
ExtendedMetadata	Controls the extended description of the query result sets: True -- FireDAC is getting a field origin table and column additional to the other column attributes. Setting this option to True may slow down a dataset opening. False -- FireDAC uses the restricted information about the query columns. This is the default value.	True
ApplicationName	Name of the application. If specified, this value is stored in the master.dbo.sysprocesses column program_name and is returned by sp_who and the Transact-SQL APP_NAME function.	AllBooks
ODBCAdvanced	Allows you to specify any other additional ODBC connection parameter value.	MARS_Connection=no;Regional=yes
MetaDefCatalog	Default database name. The Design time code excludes the catalog name from the object name if it is equal to MetaDefCatalog.	Northwind
MetaDefSchema	Default schema name. The Design time code excludes the schema name from the object name if it is equal to MetaDefSchema.	dbo
MetaCaseIns	Controls the metadata case-sensitivity: True -- case-insensitive metadata search is used. False -- depends on the database collation. This is the default value.	True

Usage Cases

Connect to the local SQL Server instance using SQL Server authentication:

DriverID=MSSQLServer=127.0.0.1Database=NorthwindUser_Name=saMetaDefSchema=dboMetaDefCatalog=Northwind

Connect to SQL Express 2005 using Windows authentication:

DriverID=MSSQLServer=DA\SQLEXPRESSDatabase=NorthwindOSAuthent=YesMARS=no

Connect to SQL Azure. Note the "@<server>" suffix in User_Name and the "tcp:" prefix in the Server parameters:

DriverID=MSSQLServer=tcp:nasdfert6.database.windows.netDatabase=NorthwindUser_Name=addemo@nasdfert6Password=asd123zxcEncrypt=YesMetaDefSchema=dboMetaDefCatalog=Northwind

Connect to LocalDB:

DriverID=MSSQLServer=(localdb)\\v11.0Database=masterOSAuthent=Yes

Connect to LocalDB and attach a database file:

Server=(localdb)\\v11.0DriverID=MSSQLODBCAdvanced=AttachDbFileName=C:\\Users\\Alex\\ADDemo.mdf