New PDO drivers in PHP 5.1 leave much to be desired.

Question

I used ADOdb for more then 2 years and was extremely satisfied with it, but decided to test-drive the new, unified, database interface. Here is a little script that I created:
#!/usr/local/bin/php
<?php
$SQL1="select * from emp where ename like :ENAME";
$name='%';
try {         $dbh = new PDO("oci:dbname=local", "scott", "tiger");          
$sth=$dbh->prepare($SQL1);
$sth->bindParam(":ENAME",$name,PDO_PARAM_STR,100);
$sth->execute();
$cnt=$sth->columnCount();
echo "This statement returns ",$cnt, " columns\n";
for($i=0;$i<$cnt;$i++) {
print_r($sth->getColumnMeta($i));
print("\n");
catch (PDOException $e) {        
echo "Failed to obtain database handle " . $e->getMessage(),"<br>\n";
?>
Here is the output:
$ ./test_pdo.php
This statement returns 8 columns
PHP Warning: PDOStatement::getColumnMeta(): SQLSTATE[IM001]: Driver does not support this function: driver doesn't support meta data in /home/mgogala/tmp/test_pdo.php on line 13
PHP Warning: PDOStatement::getColumnMeta(): SQLSTATE[IM001]: Driver does not support this function: driver doesn't support meta data in /home/mgogala/tmp/test_pdo.php on line 13
PHP Warning: PDOStatement::getColumnMeta(): SQLSTATE[IM001]: Driver does not support this function: driver doesn't support meta data in /home/mgogala/tmp/test_pdo.php on line 13
The query executes correctly, because I am getting the correct number of columns. Unfortunately,
the driver tells me that it cannot describe the column, that is, return array containing name,
native data type, length, precision and PDO data type. That is ridiculous as all 3 other methods
(OCI8, PEAR DB and ADOdb) have no problems whatsoever with describing the column. OCI8, the most comprehensive one of those packages has the following functions to that end:
ocicolumnname -- Returns the name of a column
ocicolumnprecision -- Tell the precision of a column
ocicolumnscale -- Tell the scale of a column
ocicolumnsize -- Return result column size
ocicolumntype -- Returns the data type of a column
Using those functions, I would have no problem obtaining the desired information. PDO_OCI
can't do that. So far, it is very far away from being actually usable. Things might look better
when 5.1 is actually released, but so far it can't be used. Also, when an incorrect SQL is used
in the script above, an exception is not thrown.
I commend your efforts to promote it and I believe that Zend Core for Oracle is a great thing as
it simplifies the installation a great deal, but I will continue to use ADOdb for the foreseeable future.

Answer 1

Hmmm, the script in my post is all squashed and ruined, despite my best efforts.
If you need original, please contact me at [email protected] There is also an intial version
of a DBA tool written in PHP5 on my web page, which is: http://www.mgogala.com