Chapter 11: Using SQL to Access Metadata and Managed Data Dictionaries

Overview

This chapter concludes the discussion of Advantage SQL with a look at the SQL statements and stored procedures that permit you to create and manage data dictionaries and their related objects. This discussion begins with a look at the system tables—special result sets that permit you to quickly obtain information about your data dictionary. Next, our attention turns to SQL statements that you use to create, destroy, and manage access rights to data dictionaries and their objects. These include the CREATE, DROP, GRANT, and REVOKE statements.

Finally, this chapter discusses a collection of system stored procedures that exist in both ADS (Advantage Database Server) and ALS (Advantage Local Server). You use these system stored procedures to manage data dictionaries and the objects they contain. Importantly, these system stored procedures provide you with capabilities that are not supported by other SQL statements.

This chapter also contains a number of tables that list values that are used in the system tables and system stored procedures. These tables are based on the values that apply to ADS 7.0. If you are working with a version of ADS later than 7.0, there may be additional valid values for the listed value categories.

Also, some of these tables associate a name with each code. These names are very similar to those used when you program to the ACE (Advantage Client Engine) API. In those cases, names are variable names that are defined in the header file, VB module, or Delphi unit that you add to your programming project when using the ACE API. See the appropriate source file (ace.h, ace32.bas, ace.pas, and so on) that comes with ADS for a complete list of variable names and values.