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Natively Connect to Zoho Books Data in PHP
The CData ODBC driver for Zoho Books enables you to create PHP applications with connectivity to Zoho Books data. Leverage the native support for ODBC in PHP.
Drop the CData ODBC Driver for Zoho Books into your LAMP or WAMP stack to build Zoho Books-connected Web applications. This article shows how to use PHP's ODBC built-in functions to connect to Zoho Books data, execute queries, and output the results.
Configure a DSN
If you have not already, first specify connection properties in an ODBC DSN (data source name). This is the last step of the driver installation. You can use the Microsoft ODBC Data Source Administrator to create and configure ODBC DSNs.
Zoho Books uses the OAuth authentication standard. To authenticate using OAuth, create an app to obtain the OAuthClientId, OAuthClientSecret, and CallbackURL connection properties. See the OAuth section of the Getting Started guide in the Help documentation for an authentication guide.
Establish a Connection
Open the connection to Zoho Books by calling the odbc_connect or odbc_pconnect methods. To close connections, use odbc_close or odbc_close_all.
$conn = odbc_connect("CData ODBC ZohoBooks Source","user","password");
Connections opened with odbc_connect are closed when the script ends. Connections opened with the odbc_pconnect method are still open after the script ends. This enables other scripts to share that connection when they connect with the same credentials. By sharing connections among your scripts, you can save system resources, and queries execute faster.
$conn = odbc_pconnect("CData ODBC ZohoBooks Source","user","password");
...
odbc_close($conn); //persistent connection must be closed explicitly
Create Prepared Statements
Create prepared statements and parameterized queries with the odbc_prepare function.
$query = odbc_prepare($conn, "SELECT * FROM INVOICES WHERE CustomerName = ?");
Execute Queries
Execute prepared statements with odbc_execute.
$conn = odbc_connect("CData ODBC ZohoBooks Source","user","password");
$query = odbc_prepare($conn, "SELECT * FROM INVOICES WHERE CustomerName = ?");
$success = odbc_execute($query, array('NewTech Industries'));
Execute nonparameterized queries with odbc_exec.
$conn = odbc_connect("CData ODBC ZohoBooks Source","user","password");
$query = odbc_exec($conn, "SELECT InvoiceId, InvoiceNumber FROM INVOICES WHERE CustomerName = 'NewTech Industries'");
Process Results
Access a row in the result set as an array with the odbc_fetch_array function.
$conn = odbc_connect("CData ODBC Zoho Books data Source","user","password");
$query = odbc_exec($conn, "SELECT InvoiceId, InvoiceNumber FROM INVOICES WHERE CustomerName = 'NewTech Industries'");
while($row = odbc_fetch_array($query)){
echo $row["InvoiceId"] . "\n";
}
Display the result set in an HTML table with the odbc_result_all function.
$conn = odbc_connect("CData ODBC Zoho Books data Source","user","password");
$query = odbc_prepare($conn, "SELECT * FROM INVOICES WHERE CustomerName = ?");
$success = odbc_execute($query, array('NewTech Industries'));
if($success)
odbc_result_all($query);
More Example Queries
You will find complete information on the driver's supported SQL in the help documentation. The code examples above are Zoho Books-specific adaptations of the PHP community documentation for all ODBC functions.
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Zoho Books ODBC Driver
The Zoho Books ODBC Driver is a powerful tool that allows you to connect with live data from Zoho Books, directly from any applications that support ODBC connectivity.
Access Zoho Books data like you would a database - read, write, and update Zoho Books Accounts, Bills, Journals, Taxes, etc. through a standard ODBC Driver interface.
