Zim supports Microsoft Open Database Connectivity Drivers (ODBC, defined by Microsoft as a standard way for applications to access data stored in database files) which allows third-party tools to access a Zim database via the Zim ODBC Driver.

This driver is used to access data from a Zim database that is either local to the machine on which the driver is installed or remotely located. In either case, Zim Server must be running in the machine where the database is located.

The way ZIM ODBC Driver works is this:

1) The third-party tool requires an external data connection using a Data Source (see Configuring a Data Source). This connection is performed by means of the Zim ODBC Driver;

2) Using the parameters provided by the Data Source, Zim ODBC Driver connects to Zim Server that is running in the specified machine;

3) Once the connection is established, the Zim Data Dictionary (Entity Sets and Relationships with fields) present in the Zim database is sent to the third-party tool for further operations.

Following to the connection, all operations go through these steps:

1) The third-party tool builds an SQL statement to perform the operation and sends this SQL statement to the Zim ODBC Driver;

2) The Zim ODBC Driver adapts the SQL statement to Zim needs and sends it to Zim Server;

3) Zim Server processes the statement and sends back the appropriate information;

4) This information is sent back to the third-party tool for processing.

The SQL statement provided by the third-party tool is described in Supported SQL Grammar. In particular, the SQL CREATE and SQL DROP commands are not supported for tables or indexes.