Abstract

Getting data into and out of databases is one of the most fundamental parts of data science. Much of the world’s data is stored in databases, including traditional databases such as SQL Server, MySQL, PostgreSQL, and Oracle, as well as non-traditional databases like Hive, BigQuery, Redshift and Spark. The odbc package provides an R interface to Open Database Connectivity (ODBC) drivers and databases including all those listed previously. odbc provides consistent output; including support for timestamps and 64-bit integers, improved performance for reading and writing, and complete compatibility with the DBI package. odbc connections can be used as dplyr backends, allowing one to perform expensive queries within the database and reduce the need to transfer and load large amounts of data in an R session. odbc is also integrated into the RStudio IDE, with dialogs to setup and establish connections, preview available tables and schemas and run ad-hoc SQL queries. The RStudio Professional Products are bundled with a suite of ODBC drivers, to make it easy for System Administrators to establish and support connections to a variety of database technologies.