ecpg is the embedded SQL preprocessor for C programs. It converts C programs with embedded SQL statements to normal C code by replacing the SQL invocations with special function calls. The output files can then be processed with any C compiler tool chain.
ecpg will convert each input file
given on the command line to the corresponding C output file.
Input files preferrably have the extension .pgc, in which case the extension will be
replaced by .c to determine the output
file name. If the extension of the input file is not .pgc, then the output file name is computed by
appending .c to the full file name. The
output file name can also be overridden using the -o option.
This reference page does not describe the embedded SQL language. See the PostgreSQL 7.3.21 Programmer's Guide for that.
ecpg accepts the following command-line arguments:
-cAutomatically generate C code from SQL code. Currently, this works for EXEC SQL TYPE.
-D symbolDefine a C preprocessor symbol.
-I directorySpecify an additional include path, used to find files included via EXEC SQL INCLUDE. Defaults are . (current directory), /usr/local/include, the PostgreSQL include directory which is defined at compile time (default: /usr/local/pgsql/include), and /usr/include, in that order.
-o filenameSpecifies that ecpg should write all its output to the given filename.
-tTurn on autocommit of transactions. In this mode, each query is automatically committed unless it is inside an explicit transaction block. In the default mode, queries are committed only when EXEC SQL COMMIT is issued.
-vPrint additional information including the version and the include path.
---helpShow a brief summary of the command usage, then exit.
--versionOutput version information, then exit.
When compiling the preprocessed C code files, the compiler
needs to be able to find the ECPG header files in the PostgreSQL include
directory. Therefore, one might have to use the -I option when invoking the compiler (e.g.,
-I/usr/local/pgsql/include).
Programs using C code with embedded SQL have to be linked against the libecpg library, for example using the flags -L/usr/local/pgsql/lib -lecpg.
The value of either of these directories that is appropriate for the installation can be found out using pg_config.
If you have an embedded SQL C source file named prog1.pgc, you can create an executable program using the following sequence of commands:
ecpg prog1.pgc cc -I/usr/local/pgsql/include -c prog1.c cc -o prog1 prog1.o -L/usr/local/pgsql/lib -lecpg