Database

Global variable $db used as a database connector was renamed to $DB. The framework is changed too, so consider the following piece of code:

<?php
$Database['host']="localhost";
$Database['password']="password";
require("lib/db.php");
$fields = array('field1', 'field2');
$from = 1;
$lines = 100;
isset($DB) and 
$DB->query(sql("SELECT %l FROM #__mytable LIMIT %d,%d;", $fields, $from, $lines)) and 
$results = $DB->fetchAll();
?>

Drivers

dbf

This driver will provide you some functionality to operate on dBase DBF files.

Because dBase is not real SQL database so you may perform only basic operations, like connect() or fetchrow(). Currently query() always return TRUE and does nothing else but just reset current record pointer.

<?php
$Database['Layer'] = 'dbf';
$Database['Name'] = 'c:/mydb/table.dbf';

require("lib/db.php");

echo "<pre>";

if(isset($DB)) {
	$DB->query();
	for ($i=0; $i<10 && $i<$DB->numrows(); $i++) {
		print_r($DB->fetchrow());
	}
}

echo "<br />";
print_r($Errors);
echo "</pre>";
?>

At the moment this driver is only useful to reading the data. The default connection mode is read from the Mode parameter and is read-only (0) by default. If you want, you may change it and perform your own operations with dBase functions using $DB->link property.

Using query() method always result in fetching all available records from specified database, so if you want to limit your result you'll have to set current property.

<?php
$Database['Layer'] = 'dbf';
$Database['Name'] = 'c:/mydb/table.dbf';

require("lib/db.php");

echo "<pre>";

$from=1000;
$limit=1;

if(isset($DB)) {
	$DB->query();
	$DB->current = $from;
	for ($i=0; $i<$limit && ($row=$DB->fetchrow()); $i++) {
		print_r($row);
	}
}

echo "<br />";
print_r($Errors);
echo "</pre>";
?>

Please note that using dBase for data storage is not recommended. When trying to fetch all the data in large tables you may get an error there is not sufficient memory.

Vaco dBase driver supports encoding conversion. Because the standard is to use UTF-8, so all you need is to set encoding which is used in your DBF files.

<?php
$Database['Layer'] = 'dbf';
$Database['Name'] = 'c:/mydb/table.dbf';
$Database['Charset'] = 'CP1250';
?>

If you don't want any conversion to be made please just leave $Database['Charset'] untouched.

If you need to convert characters from not supported encoding, you should handle it yourself, look at the following example:

<?php

$MAZOVIA_TO_UTF8 = array(
	"\x86"=>"ą",	"\x8d"=>"ć",	"\x91"=>"ę",	"\x92"=>"ł",
	"\xa4"=>"ń",	"\xa2"=>"ó",	"\x9e"=>"ś",	"\xa7"=>"ż",
	"\xa6"=>"ź",	"\x8f"=>"Ą",	"\x95"=>"Ć",	"\x90"=>"Ę",
	"\x9c"=>"Ł",	"\xa5"=>"Ń",	"\xa3"=>"Ó",	"\x98"=>"Ś",
	"\xa1"=>"Ż",	"\xa0"=>"Ź",
);

function mazovia_to_utf8($str)
{
	global $MAZOVIA_TO_UTF8;
	return str_replace(array_keys($MAZOVIA_TO_UTF8), array_values($MAZOVIA_TO_UTF8), $str);
}

$row = $DB->fetchrow();

foreach ($row as $key => $value) $row[$key] = mazovia_to_utf8($value);
	
?>

Custom database driver

You may want to develop your own database driver. Look at creating database drivers document for details.