Identifying the Database

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Attention: The Borland Database Engine (BDE) has been deprecated, so it will not be enhanced. For instance, BDE will never have Unicode support. You should not undertake new development with BDE. Consider migrating your existing database applications from BDE to dbExpress.

AliasName and DriverName are mutually exclusive properties that identify the database server to which the TDatabase component connects.

AliasName specifies the name of an existing BDE alias to use for the database component. The alias appears in subsequent drop-down lists for dataset components so that you can link them to a particular database component. If you specify AliasName for a database component, any value already assigned to DriverName is cleared because a driver name is always part of a BDE alias.

You create and edit BDE aliases using the Database Explorer . For more information about creating and maintaining BDE aliases, see the online documentation for these utilities.

DriverName is the name of a BDE driver. A driver name is one parameter in a BDE alias, but you may specify a driver name instead of an alias when you create a local BDE alias for a database component using the DatabaseName property. If you specify DriverName, any value already assigned to AliasName is cleared to avoid potential conflicts between the driver name you specify and the driver name that is part of the BDE alias identified in AliasName.

DatabaseName lets you provide your own name for a database connection. The name you supply is in addition to AliasName or DriverName, and is local to your application. DatabaseName can be a BDE alias, or, for Paradox and dBASE files, a fully-qualified path name. Like AliasName, DatabaseName appears in subsequent drop-down lists for dataset components to let you link them to database components.

At design time, to specify a BDE alias, assign a BDE driver, or create a local BDE alias, double-click a database component to invoke the Database Properties editor.

You can enter a DatabaseName in the Name edit box in the properties editor. You can enter an existing BDE alias name in the Alias name combo box for the Alias property, or you can choose from existing aliases in the drop-down list. The Driver name combo box enables you to enter the name of an existing BDE driver for the DriverName property, or you can choose from existing driver names in the drop-down list.

Note: The Database Properties editor also lets you view and set BDE connection parameters, and set the states of the LoginPrompt and KeepConnection properties. For information on connection parameters, see Setting BDE Alias Parameters. For information on LoginPrompt, see Controlling Server Login. For information on KeepConnection see Opening a Connection Using TDataBase.

See Also