How to install freetds in Linux?

Question

I am trying to connect to MSSQL server from Ubuntu. I have installed freetds like suggested here.

However, when I try to configure /etc/odbc.ini and enter a driver path I have no driver at location /usr/local/freetds/lib/libtdsodbc.so.

Can someone help me to install freetds and to configure odbc to use it? *edit1: I have found libtdsodbc.so in /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/odbc. Should I use that driver/path?

Answer 1

I've created a Vagrant box which has a full installation example here: https://github.com/FlipperPA/django-python3-vagrant/

...but here are the basic steps.

# Install pre-requesite packages
sudo apt-get install unixodbc unixodbc-dev freetds-dev freetds-bin tdsodbc

Point odbcinst.ini to the driver in /etc/odbcinst.ini:

[FreeTDS]
Description = v0.91 with protocol v7.2
Driver = /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/odbc/libtdsodbc.so

Create your DSNs in odbc.ini:

[dbserverdsn]
Driver = FreeTDS
Server = dbserver.domain.com
Port = 1433
TDS_Version = 7.2

...and your DSNs in freetds.conf:

[global]
    # TDS protocol version, use:
    # 7.3 for SQL Server 2008 or greater (tested through 2014)
    # 7.2 for SQL Server 2005
    # 7.1 for SQL Server 2000
    # 7.0 for SQL Server 7
    tds version = 7.2
    port = 1433

    # Whether to write a TDSDUMP file for diagnostic purposes
    # (setting this to /tmp is insecure on a multi-user system)
;   dump file = /tmp/freetds.log
;   debug flags = 0xffff

    # Command and connection timeouts
;   timeout = 10
;   connect timeout = 10

    # If you get out-of-memory errors, it may mean that your client
    # is trying to allocate a huge buffer for a TEXT field.  
    # Try setting 'text size' to a more reasonable limit 
    text size = 64512

# A typical Microsoft server
[dbserverdsn]
    host = dbserver.domain.com
    port = 1433
    tds version = 7.2

After completing this, you can test your connection by attempting to connect with tsql (to test the FreeTDS layer) and isql (for the unixODBC through FreeTDS stack).