psqlODBC finally fixed for 32/64bit

lloydalbin's picture
Submitted by lloydalbin on Tue, 02/25/2020 - 10:00

At work the finance department likes Excel and uses the ODBC drivers to get data from PostgreSQL. This worked just fine when we had 32-bit Office, but when we switched to 64-bit Office, the documents would no longer work due to the fact that the 32-bit and 64-bit drivers were named differently. Historically if you used psqlODBC on a 32bit machine (PostgreSQL Unicode) and then used the same file on a 64bit machine (PostgreSQL Unicode(x64)). Back in 2010, I created my own installer that installed both the 32-bit and 64-bit versions and installed them with the same names to get around this problem. This custom installer can now be retired, both at my work and by anybody else using it who got it from me at the Seattle Postgres Users Group.

Historically Installations:
32-bit
PostgreSQL ANSI
PostgreSQL Unicode
64-bit
PostgreSQL ANSI(x64)
PostgreSQL Unicode(x64)

New Installations as of Version 11.01.0000 released on 5/24/2019
32-bit
PostgreSQL ANSI
PostgreSQL Unicode
64-bit
PostgreSQL ANSI
PostgreSQL ANSI(x64)
PostgreSQL Unicode
PostgreSQL Unicode(x64)

Also there are now three installers
32-bit only - https://ftp.postgresql.org/pub/odbc/versions/msi/psqlodbc_12_01_0000-x86...
64-bit only - https://ftp.postgresql.org/pub/odbc/versions/msi/psqlodbc_12_01_0000-x64...
32-bit / 64-bit - https://ftp.postgresql.org/pub/odbc/versions/msi/psqlodbc_12_01_0000.zip

Note, if you are bundling the ODBC into your application, there are only two mm versions, the 32-bit only and 64-bit only. Just install them both if you want both the 32-bit and 64-bit drivers, otherwise, just install the one that you need.

This means that you will no longer have issues moving your files created with 32-bit applications and then using them on 64-bit application when you use the driver without the "(x64)" in its name. This will not automatically fix any file created on a 64-bit system using the "(x64)" version of the driver as that will only be usable on the 64-bit system unless you swap drivers to the one without the "(x64)".