Driver is a term that ODBC uses to describe the software that connects an ODBC-enabled application to a database management
system (DBMS) such as SQL Server. For Relativity, especially for the single-tier Data Manager, the driver is the entire database
management system. For the client/server variant of Relativity, the Data Client is closer to what ODBC means as a driver,
and the Data Server is closer to what ODBC means as a database management system.
Largely, the driver in use is not important to an ODBC-enabled application such as the Relativity Designer. The only time
it becomes important is when a data source is created. At that point, the ODBC administrator will request the driver to use,
and it will access the Data Source Creation routine in the driver and let it complete the process.
Thus, it is important to understand the types of Relativity drivers in order to properly understand how to answer the question
of which Relativity driver to use:
- Relativity (*.rcg)
- This is the primary Relativity driver, and it is the name of the single-tier Relativity Data Manager. In a single-tier environment,
this is the preferred driver to use with the Relativity Designer.
- Relativity for ADO (.rcg)
- This is also a single-tier Relativity Data Manager, but it implements a version of the ODBC API that works better with the
Microsoft ADO product set, such as Excel. It is not recommended to use this driver with the Relativity Designer.
- Relativity Client
- This is the client-side driver for the Relativity Data Client. If the data files being accessed are on a remote (server) machine,
it is recommended that a Relativity Data Server be installed on the server, and the Relativity Data Client be installed on
the machine with the Relativity Designer, in which case the
Relativity Client is the driver to use.
- Relativity Client for ADO
- This is the client-side driver for the Relativity Data Client, but it implements a version of the ODBC API that works better
with the Microsoft ADO product set, such as Excel. It is not recommended to use this driver with the Relativity Designer.
- Relativity Client (64-bit)
- This is the client-side driver for the Relativity Data Client to use with 64-bit ODBC-enabled applications. The Relativity
Designer is 32-bit ODBC-enabled and will not work with this driver.
- Relativity Client for ADO (64-bit)
- This is the client-side driver for the Relativity Data Client to use with 64-bit ODBC-enabled applications, but it implements
a version of the ODBC API that works better with the Microsoft ADO product set. The Relativity Designer is 32-bit ODBC-enabled
and will not work with this driver.
- Relativity Server
- This driver appears on Windows machines that have the Relativity Data Server installed. It is used to create the server-side
data sources, but is not intended for direct use. Do not use a Data Source created by this driver with the Relativity Designer.
Instead, use the
Relativity Client driver instead.