Stands for "Open Database Connectivity." With all the different
types of databases available, such as Microsoft Access,
Filemaker, and MySQL, it is important to have a standard way of
transferring data to and from each kind of database. For this
reason, the SQL Access group created the ODBC standard back in
1992. Any application that supports ODBC can access information
from an ODBC-compatible database, regardless of what database
management system the database uses. For a database to be ODBC-
compatible, it must include an ODBC database driver. This allows
other applications to connect to and access information from the
database with a standard set of commands. The driver translates
standard ODBC commands into commands understood by the
database's proprietary system. Thanks to ODBC, a single
application (such as Web server program) can access information
from several different databases using the same set of commands.