Linking tables from other database in MySQL.

Question

Is it possible to link tables from other databases (MS SQL, Sybase, etc.) inside a MySQL database, on a Debian server?

I am thinking this could be possible using ODBC.

Answer 1

Out of the box, I don't think so.

AFAIK, while its possible to implement your own functions in MySQL, these can only return single values - not tables of data.

It should be possible using a custom storage engine plugin. I believe there's one written for DB2 but a quick google turned up nothing for ODBC. It'd be a useful thing to have - so you could write one.

The only caveat is that neither the local MySQL nor the remote ODBC connected database would be able to optimise queries spanning engines properly - so it might be more efficient to handle the two systems in a progrmanning language which supports both.