SQL CREATE BRIDGE

Purpose

Creates a Recital bridge file for connection to RMS or C-ISAM data files

Syntax

CREATE BRIDGE <bridge>

TYPE <bridgetype> EXTERNAL <externalname> METADATA <metadataname> ALIAS <aliasname>

[INDEX <index> [, <index>]]

| AS <cKeyPairString>

See Also

ALTER TABLE, CREATE TABLE, DROP BRIDGE, DROP TABLE

Description

The CREATE BRIDGE command is used to create a bridge file to an external C-ISAM or RMS file. Recital clients can access Informix compatible C-ISAM files and the following fixed length RMS File types: RMS Indexed Sequential, RMS Relative and RMS Sequential. Data access is achieved through a bridge. This requires the creation of a bridge file and an empty Recital table that has a structure matching that of the external file. The empty Recital table can be created using the SQL CREATE command or the Recital CREATE Development Tool. By convention, the empty structure file is given the file extension '.str' rather than the default '.dbf', which is often given to the bridge file instead.

Keywords	Description	Maximum Width (Characters)
bridge	The name of the bridge file. The file extension defaults to '.brg'.	10 + file extension
bridgetype	External data file type: CISAM, RMSIDX, RMSREL or RMSSEQ.	10
externalname	Name of the external data file.	80
metadataname	Name of the Recital structure table.	80
aliasname	The name to use to access the file.	10
index	RMS only. For RMS Indexed Sequential files specify the existing RMS index keys. For RMS Relative and Sequential file structures you can build Recital single indexes and associate them with the bridge file. In these cases, specify the full index filenames.	50

The AS <cKeyPairString> is defined using the following key pairs:

Key Pair	Description
TYPE=<bridgetype>	External data file type: CISAM, RMSIDX, RMSREL or RMSSEQ.
EXTERNAL=<externalname>	Name of the external data file.
METADATA=<metadataname>	Name of the Recital structure table.
ALIAS=<aliasname>	The name to use to access the file.
INDEXKEY1=<index>... INDEXKEY7=<index>	RMS only. For RMS Indexed Sequential files specify the existing RMS index keys. For RMS Relative and Sequential file structures you can build Recital single indexes and associate them with the bridge file. In these cases, specify the full index filenames.

Each key pair is separated by a semi-colon, ';'.

Example

CREATE BRIDGE cisamdemo.dbf;
  TYPE "CISAM";
  EXTERNAL "cisamdemo.dat";
  METADATA "cisamdemo.str";
  ALIAS "cisamdemo"
 
//or
 
CREATE BRIDGE cisamdemo.dbf;
  AS "TYPE=CISAM;EXTERNAL=cisamdemo.dat;METADATA=cisamdemo.str;ALIAS=cisamdemo"
 
CREATE BRIDGE rmsidxdemo.dbf; 
  TYPE "RMSIDX";
  EXTERNAL "rmsidx.dat";
  METADATA "rmsidxdemo.str";
  ALIAS "rmsidxdemo";
  INDEX "acc_prefix+acc_no,acc_prefix+str(ord_total)"
 
//or 
 
CREATE BRIDGE rmsidxdemo.dbf;
  AS "type=RMSIDX;external=rmsidx.dat;metadata=rmsidxdemo.str;alias=rmsidxdemo;;
  indexkey1=acc_prefix+acc_no;indexkey2=acc_prefix+str(ord_total)"
 
 
CREATE BRIDGE rmsreldemo.dbf; 
  TYPE "RMSRELX";
  EXTERNAL "rmsrel.dat";
  METADATA "rmsreldemo.str";
  ALIAS "rmsreldemo";
  INDEX "ind1.ndx,ind2.ndx,ind3.ndx"
 
//or 
 
CREATE BRIDGE rmsreldemo.dbf;
  AS "type=RMSREL;external=rmsrel.dat;metadata=rmsreldemo.str;alias=rmsreldemo;;
  indexkey1=ind1.ndx;indexkey2=ind2.ndx,indexkey3=ind3.ndx"

Products

Recital Server, Recital