gr8 thanks so much for your quick response, i can also see options in the ODBC 
settings to make this connection read only etc

cheers
Chris
--- In [email protected], Helen Borrie <helebor@...> wrote:
>
> At 11:22 AM 24/07/2012, crizz11 wrote:
> >If I access a table in a firebird database from excel using ODBC is that 
> >table automatically in a locked state until i quit excel?
> 
> No. Firebird doesn't lock tables the way you are used to with Access, for 
> example.  Firebird employs what is known as "optimistic locking", whose exact 
> behaviour is determined by the way the enclosing transaction is configured. 
> 
> What you will have is a transaction started through the ODBC interface.  The 
> isolation level of that transaction determines how stable your application's 
> view will remain throughout the transaction and the behaviour when two or 
> more transactions want to modify the same row.  SNAPSHOT isolation (which I 
> think is the default for the Firebird ODBC driver) means that Excel continues 
> to see the set as it was at the start of the transaction.  READ COMMITTED 
> isolation means that Excel can refresh the set to get an updated view of what 
> other transactions have committed since its own transaction started.
> 
> If another transaction has a pending update on a row in the set that Excel is 
> viewing, a lock conflict occurs and Excel won't be able to update that row.  
> If Excel has an update pending on a row in that set, other transactions won't 
> be able to update that row.
>  
> ./hb
>


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