Zim can manipulate and retrieve data from third-party data sources as well as from a Zim database. Client applications for SQL database servers are designed and developed as complete Zim application systems. The objective of the Zim product is 100 percent source code portability of applications including seamless access to databases being managed by SQL relational database management systems (SQL servers) supplied by independent vendors. In fact, a Zim Client-Server database application can consist of an arbitrary mixture of tables managed by an SQL server and entity sets and relationships managed by Zim.

As an architectural model, client-server architecture consists of two components: a server process and a client process. A server process provides services to client processes, whereas a client process requests services from a server process.

A database management system is a server process that provides database access and update services to application programs (client processes). Any application program that issues database requests to a database management system is a client-server database application. The database server can be on the same machine as the application program, it can be a database server on a local area network; or it can be on a host machine with access through a gateway. In all cases, the application program is acting as a client and the database management system is acting as a server.

In order to use the client-server capabilities of Zim, two software components are required:

Zim software

The JDBC SAM (Server Access Module) which makes a “bridge” between the Zim application and the specific SQL database server in use. Any SQL database servers available in the market allow the JDBC connection, both in 32 or 64 bits.