Servers and databases

The relationship between servers and databases is different in Adaptive Server Enterprise from Sybase IQ and Adaptive Server Anywhere.

In Adaptive Server Enterprise, each database exists inside a server, and each server can contain several databases. Users can have login rights to the server, and can connect to the server. They can then connect to any of the databases on that server, provided that they have permissions. System-wide system tables, held in a master database, contain information common to all databases on the server.

In Sybase IQ, there is no level corresponding to the Adaptive Server Enterprise master database. Instead, each database is an independent entity, containing all of its system tables. Users can have connection rights to a database, not to the server. When a user connects, they connect to an individual database. There is no system-wide set of system tables maintained at a master database level. Each Sybase IQ database server can dynamically start and stop a database, to which users can maintain independent connections. Sybase strongly recommends that you run only one Sybase IQ database per server.

Adaptive Server Anywhere and Sybase IQ provide tools in their Transact-SQL support and Open Server support to allow some tasks to be carried out in a manner similar to Adaptive Server Enterprise. There are differences, however, in exactly how these tools are implemented.

For information about Open Server support, see the Sybase IQ System Administration Guide. Chapter 15, “Sybase IQ as a Data Server” in that book includes details on how to use isql to connect to a specific database on a server with multiple databases.