Database Connection Overview

You get the most out of TurboData when it is used directly with your physical database. TurboData accesses your databases based upon the connection information you enter.

This chapter describes the different types of connection information that may be entered, such as user id, password, database name and server name. The amount of detail you need to enter depends on the database provider.

There are 3 places where TurboData requires database connection information:

• Source database, where TurboData reads the database schema from.
• Target database, where TurboData allows the direct creation, update, reading and deletion of data. The default is the source database, but you may change this to point to another database.
• Alternate Data Source, for reading in values from a database to be used when generating data. This is useful for creating very realistic test data, based on legacy systems, or for the actual conversion of data from one database to another.

Once you have entered the database connection information into TurboData it is saved. You can select this information if you need to set up another connection to the same database using a Select dialog.

Connect and Disconnect from the target database via the toolbar, or from the Database menu. Check the status bar on the main TurboData window to see if the target database is connected or not.