ibase_connect

(PHP 5, PHP 7)

ibase_connect — Open a connection to a database

Description

resource ibase_connect ([ string $database [, string $username [, string $password [, string $charset [, int $buffers [, int $dialect [, string $role [, int $sync ]]]]]]]] )

Establishes a connection to an Firebird/InterBase server.

In case a second call is made to ibase_connect() with the same arguments, no new link will be established, but instead, the link identifier of the already opened link will be returned. The link to the server will be closed as soon as the execution of the script ends, unless it's closed earlier by explicitly calling ibase_close().

Parameters

database: The database argument has to be a valid path to database file on the server it resides on. If the server is not local, it must be prefixed with either 'hostname:' (TCP/IP), 'hostname/port:' (TCP/IP with interbase server on custom TCP port), '//hostname/' (NetBEUI), depending on the connection protocol used.
username: The user name. Can be set with the ibase.default_user php.ini directive.
password: The password for username. Can be set with the ibase.default_password php.ini directive.
charset: charset is the default character set for a database.
buffers: buffers is the number of database buffers to allocate for the server-side cache. If 0 or omitted, server chooses its own default.
dialect: dialect selects the default SQL dialect for any statement executed within a connection, and it defaults to the highest one supported by client libraries.
role: Functional only with InterBase 5 and up.
sync

Return Values

Returns an Firebird/InterBase link identifier on success, or FALSE on error.

Errors/Exceptions

If you get some error like "arithmetic exception, numeric overflow, or string truncation. Cannot transliterate character between character sets" (this occurs when you try use some character with accents) when using this and after ibase_query() you must set the character set (i.e. ISO8859_1 or your current character set).

Examples

Example #1 ibase_connect() example


<?php
$host = 'localhost:/path/to/your.gdb';

$dbh = ibase_connect($host, $username, $password);
$stmt = 'SELECT * FROM tblname';
$sth = ibase_query($dbh, $stmt);
while ($row = ibase_fetch_object($sth)) {
    echo $row->email, "\n";
}
ibase_free_result($sth);
ibase_close($dbh);
?>

User Contributed Notes

ag at dividi dot de

10 years ago


With php5 on Windows i couldnt connect to a firebird database with following error :

Warning: ibase_connect(): Unable to complete network request to host "localhost"
. Failed to locate host machine. Undefined service gds_db/tcp.  in C:\\wamp\\php\\ibase.php on line 5

the connect command was "$dbh = ibase_connect ("localhost:path_to_file.fdb", $username, $password);"

The solution is to insert the line 
gds_db    3050/tcp    #firebird Database
into the windows services file %WINDIR%\\system32\\drivers\\etc\\services

fwrk at bk dot ru

1 year ago


If you want to connect to interbase server runned on custom port (not default port 3050), you can specify it in "database" parameter in this way: 'hostname/port:' (TCP/IP with custom port).
Examples:
$dbh = ibase_connect('example.com/11099:dbalias', $username, $password);
$dbh = ibase_connect('example.com/11099:var/data/myibase.fdb', $username, $password);
$dbh = ibase_connect('example.com/11099:C:\\data\\mywinibase.fdb', $username, $password);

fb dot bird at gmail dot com

8 years ago


Remember for different locations
of php.ini file:

..\xampp\php\php.ini 
..\xampp\apache\bin\php.ini
..\xampp\php\php4\php.ini

Please do not confuse this
and know location _loaded_ *.ini-file!

simon at thorndancer dot com

12 years ago


I found it difficult to get anything working using the current documentation.
While logic would suggest that the format in the docs should work (being based on all the 
syntax of other standard database access functions) I had problem after problem. Finally I
found some comments on a newgroup that helped, and this is the result.

This is actual production code (not a mere example). It works. 
Don't ask me why it is so different from the official docs.

if ( ibase_connect( $db_filespec,$db_user,$db_pass_word) ) 
{
    $query  = "SELECT c.id, c.title, c.description ";    
    $query .= "FROM collections c ";   
    $query .= "WHERE (c.id = $page_id) ";                                       

    $result = ibase_query( $query );

    $row_array = ibase_fetch_row($result);

    $row_fetched = !empty($row_array);

    if ($row_fetched)      
    {                     
       // Extract the row into variables

        $collection_id   = $row_array[0];            
       $edit_title      = $row_array[1];            
       $edit_desc       = $row_array[2];            

       // Standardise the record contents

        $collection_id   = $collection_id + 0;      // force type to numeric
     } 

    // Wrap up the database side of things

     ibase_commit();     // note parenthesis but no parameters. 

     ibase_close;        // note total lack of parenthesis and parameters !
}
        
You'll notice that there is no reference to a database handle in this code. 
It seems to be implicit when dealing with interbase functions. Certainly, I couldn't
get the code to work when using it explicitly. This makes the documentation
very hard to work with, and any reference to a handle needs to be ignored.

Important: ibase_close doesn't work for me if I put parenthesis after it. 
eg:
        ibase_close;        // works
        ibase_close();      // fails
        ibase_close($db);   // fails
        
Note: the line "if ($row_fetched)" could be replaced with "while ($row_fetched)"
if you need to process more than one record.

All that said, Interbase is a fantastic database to work with and IMHO a much 
better choice than something like PostgreSQL if you need to move up from MySQL
to something more industrial strength. Just be sure to RTFM.

anthony at trams dot com

15 years ago


If you get a message like: 'Dynamic SQL Error SQL error code = -901 feature is not supported', this may be caused by InterBASE client 6.01 accessing a server running 5.x.



Make sure the dialect value is set to '1', like the following:



ibase_connect ('localhost:/usr/db/db.gdb', 'SYSDBA', 'masterkey', 'ISO8859_1', '100', '1' ) ;



That last value is the dialect, but you need the two preceding also, do avoid errors.





Anthony

Robert Silvia

11 years ago


Just to update Simon's note...

Things must have been fixed since Simon wrote that note.
With PHP5 the following example works flawlessly:

$strconnect = 'localhost:/opt/firebird/examples/employee.fdb';

if (!($db=ibase_connect($strconnect, 'sysdba', 'yourpass', 'ISO8859_1', 0, 1)))
    die('Could not connect: ' .  ibase_errmsg());

  $sql  = "SELECT PO_NUMBER, ORDER_STATUS, ITEM_TYPE FROM SALES"; 
  $cursor = ibase_query($sql);
  $row_array = ibase_fetch_row($cursor);
   
  print_r($row_array);

  ibase_free_result($cursor);
  ibase_close($db);

Also you CAN get away with the following connection string:
ibase_connect('/opt/firebird/examples/employee.fdb', 'sysdba', 'yourpass')

sam at intranex.ru