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The SFTP ODBC Driver is a powerful tool that allows you to connect with live data from remote files and directories, directly from any applications that support ODBC connectivity.

Access remote data like you would a database through a standard ODBC Driver interface.

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Natively Connect to SFTP Data in PHP


The CData ODBC driver for SFTP enables you to create PHP applications with connectivity to SFTP data. Leverage the native support for ODBC in PHP.

Drop the CData ODBC Driver for SFTP into your LAMP or WAMP stack to build SFTP-connected Web applications. This article shows how to use PHP's ODBC built-in functions to connect to SFTP data, execute queries, and output the results.

Configure a DSN

If you have not already, first specify connection properties in an ODBC DSN (data source name). This is the last step of the driver installation. You can use the Microsoft ODBC Data Source Administrator to create and configure ODBC DSNs.

SFTP can be used to transfer files to and from SFTP servers using the SFTP Protocol. To connect, specify the RemoteHost;. service uses the User and Password and public key authentication (SSHClientCert). Choose an SSHAuthMode and specify connection values based on your selection.

Set the following connection properties to control the relational view of the file system:

  • RemotePath: Set this to the current working directory.
  • TableDepth: Set this to control the depth of subfolders to report as views.
  • FileRetrievalDepth: Set this to retrieve files recursively and list them in the Root table.
Stored Procedures are available to download files, upload files, and send protocol commands. See gdatamodel for more on using SQL to interact with the server.

Establish a Connection

Open the connection to SFTP by calling the odbc_connect or odbc_pconnect methods. To close connections, use odbc_close or odbc_close_all.

$conn = odbc_connect("CData ODBC SFTP Source","user","password");

Connections opened with odbc_connect are closed when the script ends. Connections opened with the odbc_pconnect method are still open after the script ends. This enables other scripts to share that connection when they connect with the same credentials. By sharing connections among your scripts, you can save system resources, and queries execute faster.

$conn = odbc_pconnect("CData ODBC SFTP Source","user","password"); ... odbc_close($conn); //persistent connection must be closed explicitly

Create Prepared Statements

Create prepared statements and parameterized queries with the odbc_prepare function.

$query = odbc_prepare($conn, "SELECT * FROM MyDirectory WHERE FilePath = ?");

Execute Queries

Execute prepared statements with odbc_execute.

$conn = odbc_connect("CData ODBC SFTP Source","user","password"); $query = odbc_prepare($conn, "SELECT * FROM MyDirectory WHERE FilePath = ?"); $success = odbc_execute($query, array('/documents/doc.txt'));

Execute nonparameterized queries with odbc_exec.

$conn = odbc_connect("CData ODBC SFTP Source","user","password"); $query = odbc_exec($conn, "SELECT Filesize, Filename FROM MyDirectory WHERE FilePath = /documents/doc.txt");

Process Results

Access a row in the result set as an array with the odbc_fetch_array function.

$conn = odbc_connect("CData ODBC SFTP data Source","user","password"); $query = odbc_exec($conn, "SELECT Filesize, Filename FROM MyDirectory WHERE FilePath = /documents/doc.txt"); while($row = odbc_fetch_array($query)){ echo $row["Filesize"] . "\n"; }

Display the result set in an HTML table with the odbc_result_all function.

$conn = odbc_connect("CData ODBC SFTP data Source","user","password"); $query = odbc_prepare($conn, "SELECT * FROM MyDirectory WHERE FilePath = ?"); $success = odbc_execute($query, array('/documents/doc.txt')); if($success) odbc_result_all($query);

More Example Queries

You will find complete information on the driver's supported SQL in the help documentation. The code examples above are SFTP-specific adaptations of the PHP community documentation for all ODBC functions.