php-doc-en/reference/ifx/reference.xml

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 <reference id="ref.ifx">
  <title>Informix functions</title>
  <titleabbrev>Informix</titleabbrev>

  <partintro>
   <section id="ifx.intro">
   &reftitle.intro;
    <para>
     The Informix driver for Informix (IDS) 7.x, SE 7.x, Universal
     Server (IUS) 9.x and IDS 2000 is implemented in "ifx.ec" and
     "php3_ifx.h" in the informix extension directory.  IDS 7.x support
     is fairly complete, with full support for BYTE and TEXT
     columns. IUS 9.x support is partly finished: the new data types
     are there, but SLOB and CLOB support is still under construction.
    </para>
   </section>

   <section id="ifx.requirements">
    &reftitle.required;
     <note>
     <title>Configuration notes</title>
      <para>
       You need a version of ESQL/C to compile the PHP Informix driver.
       ESQL/C versions from 7.2x on should be OK. ESQL/C is now part of
       the Informix Client SDK.
      </para>
      <para>
       Make sure that the "INFORMIXDIR" variable has been set, and that
       $INFORMIXDIR/bin is in your PATH before you run the "configure"
       script.
      </para>
     </note>
   </section>

   <section id="ifx.installation">
    &reftitle.install;
    <note>
     <para>
      The configure script will autodetect the libraries and include
      directories, if you run configure
      <option role="configure">--with_informix=yes</option>. You can
      override this detection by specifying "IFX_LIBDIR", "IFX_LIBS" and
      "IFX_INCDIR" in the environment.  The configure script will also
      try to detect your Informix server version.  It will set the
      "HAVE_IFX_IUS" conditional compilation variable if your Informix
      version &gt;= 9.00.
     </para>
    </note>
   </section>

   <section id="ifx.configuration">
    &reftitle.runtime;
    <note>
     <para>
      Make sure that the Informix environment variables INFORMIXDIR and
      INFORMIXSERVER are available to the PHP ifx driver, and that the
      INFORMIX bin directory is in the PATH. Check this by running a
      script that contains a call to <function>phpinfo</function>
      before you start testing. The <function>phpinfo</function>
      output should list these environment variables. This is &true; for
      both CGI php and Apache mod_php. You may have to set these
      environment variables in your Apache startup script.
     </para>
     <para>
      The Informix shared libraries should also be available to the
      loader (check LD_LINBRARY_PATH or ld.so.conf/ldconfig).
     </para>
    </note>
    <note>
     <title>
      Some notes on the use of BLOBs (TEXT and BYTE columns)
     </title>
     <para>
      BLOBs are normally addressed by BLOB identifiers.  Select queries
      return a "blob id" for every BYTE and TEXT column.  You can get
      at the contents with "string_var = ifx_get_blob($blob_id);" if
      you choose to get the BLOBs in memory (with :
      "ifx_blobinfile(0);").  If you prefer to receive the content of
      BLOB columns in a file, use "ifx_blobinfile(1);", and
      "ifx_get_blob($blob_id);" will get you the filename.  Use normal
      file I/O to get at the blob contents.
     </para>
     <para>
      For insert/update queries you must create these "blob id's"
      yourself with "<function>ifx_create_blob</function>;". You then
      plug the blob id's into an array, and replace the blob columns
      with a question mark (?) in the query string.  For
      updates/inserts, you are responsible for setting the blob
      contents with <function>ifx_update_blob</function>.
     </para>
     <para>
      The behaviour of BLOB columns can be altered by configuration
      variables that also can be set at runtime :
     </para>
     <para>
      configuration variable : ifx.textasvarchar
     </para>
     <para>
      configuration variable : ifx.byteasvarchar
     </para>
     <para>
      runtime functions :
     </para>
     <para>
      ifx_textasvarchar(0) : use blob id's for select queries with TEXT
      columns
     </para>
     <para>
      ifx_byteasvarchar(0) : use blob id's for select queries with BYTE
      columns
     </para>
     <para>
      ifx_textasvarchar(1) : return TEXT columns as if they were
      VARCHAR columns, so that you don't need to use blob id's for
      select queries.
     </para>
     <para>
      ifx_byteasvarchar(1) : return BYTE columns as if they were
      VARCHAR columns, so that you don't need to use blob id's for
      select queries.
     </para>
     <para>
      configuration variable : ifx.blobinfile
     </para>
     <para>
      runtime function :
     </para>
     <para>
      ifx_blobinfile_mode(0) : return BYTE columns in memory, the blob
      id lets you get at the contents.
     </para>
     <para>
      ifx_blobinfile_mode(1) : return BYTE columns in a file, the blob
      id lets you get at the file name.
     </para>
     <para>
      If you set ifx_text/byteasvarchar to 1, you can use TEXT and BYTE
      columns in select queries just like normal (but rather long)
      VARCHAR fields.  Since all strings are "counted" in PHP, this
      remains "binary safe".  It is up to you to handle this
      correctly. The returned data can contain anything, you are
      responsible for the contents.
     </para>
     <para>
      If you set ifx_blobinfile to 1, use the file name returned by
      ifx_get_blob(..) to get at the blob contents.  Note that in this
      case YOU ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR DELETING THE TEMPORARY FILES CREATED
      BY INFORMIX when fetching the row.  Every new row fetched will
      create new temporary files for every BYTE column.
     </para>
     <para>
      The location of the temporary files can be influenced by the
      environment variable "blobdir", default is "." (the current
      directory).  Something like : putenv(blobdir=tmpblob"); will ease
      the cleaning up of temp files accidentally left behind (their
      names all start with "blb").
     </para>
    </note>
    <note>
     <title>Automatically trimming "char" (SQLCHAR and SQLNCHAR) data</title>
     <para>
      This can be set with the configuration variable
     </para>
     <para>
      ifx.charasvarchar : if set to 1 trailing spaces will be
      automatically trimmed, to save you some "chopping".
     </para>
    </note>
    <note>
     <title>&null; values</title>
     <para>
      The configuration variable ifx.nullformat (and the runtime
      function <function>ifx_nullformat</function>) when set to &true;
      will return &null; columns as the string "&null;", when set to &false;
      they return the empty string. This allows you to discriminate
      between &null; columns and empty columns.
     </para>
    </note>
   </section>

   <section id="ifx.resources">
    &reftitle.resources;
    <para>
    </para>
   </section>

   <section id="ifx.constants">
    &reftitle.constants;
    &no.constants;
   </section>



  </partintro>

&reference.ifx.functions;

 </reference>
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