% file RODBC/man/sqlTypeInfo.Rd
% copyright (C) 1999-2013  M. Lapsley and B. D. Ripley
%
\name{sqlTypeInfo}
\alias{sqlTypeInfo}

\title{Request Information about Data Types in an ODBC Database}
\description{
  Request information about data types in an ODBC database
}
\usage{
sqlTypeInfo(channel, type = "all", errors = TRUE, as.is = TRUE)
}
\arguments{
  \item{channel}{connection handle as returned by \code{\link{odbcConnect}}.}
  \item{type}{The types of columns about which information is requested.
    Possible values are \code{"all"}, \code{"char"}, \code{"varchar"} ,
    \code{"wchar"}, \code{"wvarchar"} (Unicode), \code{"real"},
    \code{"float"}, \code{"double"}, \code{"integer"},
    \code{"smallint"}, \code{"date"}, \code{"time"},
    \code{"timestamp"}, \code{"binary"}, \code{"varbinary"},
    \code{"longvarbinary"} and (its alias) \code{"blob"}.
  }
  \item{errors}{logical: if true halt and display error, else return \code{-1}.}
  \item{as.is}{as in \code{\link{sqlGetResults}}.}
}
\details{
  \code{sqlTypeInfo} attempts to find the types of columns the database
  supports: ODBC drivers are not required to support this (but all known
  examples do).  Where it is supported, it is used by
  \code{\link{sqlSave}} to decide what column types to create when
  creating a new table in the database.
}
\value{
  A data frame on success, or character/numeric on error depending on
  the \code{errors} argument.  Use \code{\link{sqlGetResults}} for
  further details of errors.

  The columns returned may depend on the ODBC driver manager.  For a
  fully ODBC 3 manager, see
  \url{http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms714632\%28VS.85\%29.aspx}:
  the symbolic constants mentioned there will be returned as numbers
  (and the values of the numeric constants can be found in the ODBC
  headers such as \file{sql.h} and \file{sqlext.h}).
}
\seealso{
  \code{\link{sqlGetResults}}, \code{\link{odbcGetInfo}}
}
\author{
  Brian Ripley
}
\examples{\dontrun{
> names(sqlTypeInfo(channel))
 [1] "TYPE_NAME"          "DATA_TYPE"          "COLUMN_SIZE"       
 [4] "LITERAL_PREFIX"     "LITERAL_SUFFIX"     "CREATE_PARAMS"     
 [7] "NULLABLE"           "CASE_SENSITIVE"     "SEARCHABLE"        
[10] "UNSIGNED_ATTRIBUTE" "FIXED_PREC_SCALE"   "AUTO_UNIQUE_VALUE" 
[13] "LOCAL_TYPE_NAME"    "MINIMUM_SCALE"      "MAXIMUM_SCALE"     
[16] "SQL_DATATYPE"       "SQL_DATETIME_SUB"   "NUM_PREC_RADIX"    
[19] "INTERVAL_PRECISION"
}}
\keyword{IO}
\keyword{database}
