Programming the Perl DBI

The Database Proxy Architecture

The DBI supports database proxying through two modules, DBD::Proxy and DBI::ProxyServer . DBD::Proxy is used by client programs to talk to a proxy server that is implemented with the DBI::ProxyServer module. Figure 8.1 illustrates the architecture.

Figure 8-1. DBI proxy architecture

Because the DBI::ProxyServer module uses the underlying database drivers to actually interface with the databases, any type of database can be queried and manipulated via proxy, including CSV files and XBase (DBF) files. The DBI proxy architecture does not restrict you to using high-end databases such as Oracle or Informix.

So how do we use this proxy server? Let’s look at the common example of a Perl program running on a Unix box that wants to query a Microsoft Access database running on a Windows machine.