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Install the Microsoft ODBC driver for SQL Server (Linux)

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This article explains how to install the Microsoft ODBC Driver for SQL Server on Linux. It also includes instructions for the optional command-line tools for SQL Server (bcp and sqlcmd) and the unixODBC development headers.

This article provides commands for installing the ODBC driver from the bash shell. If you want to download the packages directly, see Download ODBC Driver for SQL Server.

Microsoft ODBC 18

The following sections explain how to install the Microsoft ODBC driver 18 from the bash shell for different Linux distributions. Supported distributions are Alpine Linux, Debian, Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL), Oracle Linux, SUSE Linux Enterprise Server (SLES), and Ubuntu. Starting with version 18.4, to accept the EULA automatically when installing the non-Alpine Linux (.deb or .rpm) driver, you can create the file '/opt/microsoft/msodbcsql18/ACCEPT_EULA'.

case $(uname -m) in
    x86_64)   architecture="amd64" ;;
    arm64)   architecture="arm64" ;;
    *) architecture="unsupported" ;;
esac
if [[ "unsupported" == "$architecture" ]];
then
    echo "Alpine architecture $(uname -m) is not currently supported.";
    exit;
fi

#Download the desired package(s)
curl -O https://download.microsoft.com/download/7/6/d/76de322a-d860-4894-9945-f0cc5d6a45f8/msodbcsql18_18.4.1.1-1_$architecture.apk
curl -O https://download.microsoft.com/download/7/6/d/76de322a-d860-4894-9945-f0cc5d6a45f8/mssql-tools18_18.4.1.1-1_$architecture.apk

#(Optional) Verify signature, if 'gpg' is missing install it using 'apk add gnupg':
curl -O https://download.microsoft.com/download/7/6/d/76de322a-d860-4894-9945-f0cc5d6a45f8/msodbcsql18_18.4.1.1-1_$architecture.sig
curl -O https://download.microsoft.com/download/7/6/d/76de322a-d860-4894-9945-f0cc5d6a45f8/mssql-tools18_18.4.1.1-1_$architecture.sig

curl https://packages.microsoft.com/keys/microsoft.asc  | gpg --import -
gpg --verify msodbcsql18_18.4.1.1-1_$architecture.sig msodbcsql18_18.4.1.1-1_$architecture.apk
gpg --verify mssql-tools18_18.4.1.1-1_$architecture.sig mssql-tools18_18.4.1.1-1_$architecture.apk

#Install the package(s)
sudo apk add --allow-untrusted msodbcsql18_18.4.1.1-1_$architecture.apk
sudo apk add --allow-untrusted mssql-tools18_18.4.1.1-1_$architecture.apk

Note

Driver version 17.5 or higher is required for Alpine support.

Previous versions

The following sections provide instructions for installing previous versions of the Microsoft ODBC driver on Linux. The following driver versions are covered:

Microsoft ODBC 17

The following sections explain how to install the Microsoft ODBC driver 17 from the bash shell for different Linux distributions.

Important

If you installed the v17 msodbcsql package that was briefly available, you should remove it before installing the msodbcsql17 package. This will avoid conflicts. The msodbcsql17 package can be installed side by side with the msodbcsql v13 package.

#Download the desired package(s)
curl -O https://download.microsoft.com/download/e/4/e/e4e67866-dffd-428c-aac7-8d28ddafb39b/msodbcsql17_17.10.5.1-1_amd64.apk
curl -O https://download.microsoft.com/download/e/4/e/e4e67866-dffd-428c-aac7-8d28ddafb39b/mssql-tools_17.10.1.1-1_amd64.apk

#(Optional) Verify signature, if 'gpg' is missing install it using 'apk add gnupg':
curl -O https://download.microsoft.com/download/e/4/e/e4e67866-dffd-428c-aac7-8d28ddafb39b/msodbcsql17_17.10.5.1-1_amd64.sig
curl -O https://download.microsoft.com/download/e/4/e/e4e67866-dffd-428c-aac7-8d28ddafb39b/mssql-tools_17.10.1.1-1_amd64.sig

curl https://packages.microsoft.com/keys/microsoft.asc  | gpg --import -
gpg --verify msodbcsql17_17.10.5.1-1_amd64.sig msodbcsql17_17.10.5.1-1_amd64.apk
gpg --verify mssql-tools_17.10.1.1-1_amd64.sig mssql-tools_17.10.1.1-1_amd64.apk

#Install the package(s)
sudo apk add --allow-untrusted msodbcsql17_17.10.5.1-1_amd64.apk
sudo apk add --allow-untrusted mssql-tools_17.10.1.1-1_amd64.apk

Note

Driver version 17.5 or higher is required for Alpine support.

ODBC 13.1

The following sections explain how to install the Microsoft ODBC driver 13.1 from the bash shell for different Linux distributions.

curl https://packages.microsoft.com/keys/microsoft.asc | sudo tee /etc/apt/trusted.gpg.d/microsoft.asc
curl https://packages.microsoft.com/config/debian/8/prod.list | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/mssql-release.list
sudo apt-get update
sudo ACCEPT_EULA=Y apt-get install msodbcsql
# optional: for bcp and sqlcmd
sudo ACCEPT_EULA=Y apt-get install mssql-tools
echo 'export PATH="$PATH:/opt/mssql-tools/bin"' >> ~/.bashrc
source ~/.bashrc
# optional: for unixODBC development headers
sudo apt-get install unixodbc-dev

ODBC 13

The following sections explain how to install the Microsoft ODBC driver 13 from the bash shell for different Linux distributions.

curl https://packages.microsoft.com/config/rhel/7/prod.repo | sudo tee /etc/yum.repos.d/mssql-release.repo
sudo yum update
sudo yum remove unixODBC #to avoid conflicts
sudo ACCEPT_EULA=Y yum install msodbcsql-13.0.1.0-1 mssql-tools-14.0.2.0-1
sudo yum install unixODBC-utf16-devel #this step is optional but recommended*
#Create symlinks for tools
sudo ln -sfn /opt/mssql-tools/bin/sqlcmd-13.0.1.0 /usr/bin/sqlcmd
sudo ln -sfn /opt/mssql-tools/bin/bcp-13.0.1.0 /usr/bin/bcp

Offline installation

If you need the Microsoft ODBC Driver 13 to be installed on a computer with no Internet connection, you must resolve package dependencies manually. The Microsoft ODBC Driver 13 has the following direct dependencies:

  • Ubuntu: libc6 (>= 2.21), libstdc++6 (>= 4.9), libkrb5-3, libcurl3, openssl, debconf (>= 0.5), unixodbc (>= 2.3.1-1)
  • Red Hat: glibc, e2fsprogs, krb5-libs, openssl, unixODBC
  • SUSE: glibc, libuuid1, krb5, openssl, unixODBC

Each of these packages in turn has their own dependencies, which might or might not be present on the system. For a general solution to this issue, refer to your distribution's package manager documentation: Red Hat, Ubuntu, and SUSE

It's also common to manually download all the dependent packages and place them together on the installation computer, then manually install each package in turn, finishing with the Microsoft ODBC Driver 13 package.

sudo yum install glibc e2fsprogs krb5-libs openssl unixODBC unixODBC-devel #install dependencies
sudo rpm -i  msodbcsql-13.1.X.X-X.x86_64.rpm #install the Driver

ODBC 11

The following sections explain how to install the Microsoft ODBC driver 11 on Linux. Before you can use the driver, install the unixODBC driver manager. For more information, see Installing the Driver Manager.

Installation steps

Important

These instructions refer to msodbcsql-11.0.2270.0.tar.gz, which is installation file for Red Hat Linux. If you install the Preview for SUSE Linux, the file name is msodbcsql-11.0.2260.0.tar.gz.

To install the driver:

  1. Make sure that you have root permission.

  2. Change to the directory where the download placed the file msodbcsql-11.0.2270.0.tar.gz. Make sure that you have the *.tar.gz file that matches your version of Linux. To extract the files, execute the following command, tar xvzf msodbcsql-11.0.2270.0.tar.gz.

  3. Change to the msodbcsql-11.0.2270.0 directory and there you should see a file called install.sh.

  4. To see a list of the available installation options, execute the following command: ./install.sh.

  5. Make a backup of odbcinst.ini. The driver installation updates odbcinst.ini. odbcinst.ini contains the list of drivers that are registered with the unixODBC Driver Manager. To discover the location of odbcinst.ini on your computer, execute the following command: odbc_config --odbcinstini.

  6. Before you install the driver, execute the following command: ./install.sh verify. The output of ./install.sh verify reports if your computer has the required software to support the ODBC driver on Linux.

  7. When you're ready to install the ODBC driver on Linux, execute the command: ./install.sh install. If you need to specify an install command (bin-dir or lib-dir), specify the command after the install option.

  8. After reviewing the license agreement, type YES to continue with the installation.

Installation puts the driver in /opt/microsoft/msodbcsql/11.0.2270.0. The driver and its support files must be in /opt/microsoft/msodbcsql/11.0.2270.0.

To verify that the Microsoft ODBC driver on Linux was registered successfully, execute the following command: odbcinst -q -d -n "ODBC Driver 11 for SQL Server".

Uninstall

You can uninstall the ODBC driver 11 on Linux by executing the following commands:

  1. rm -f /usr/bin/sqlcmd

  2. rm -f /usr/bin/bcp

  3. rm -rf /opt/microsoft/msodbcsql

  4. odbcinst -u -d -n "ODBC Driver 11 for SQL Server"

Driver files

The ODBC driver on Linux consists of the following components:

Component Description
libmsodbcsql-17.X.so.X.X or libmsodbcsql-13.X.so.X.X The shared object (so) dynamic library file that contains all of the driver's functionality. This file is installed in /opt/microsoft/msodbcsql17/lib64/ for the Driver 17 and in /opt/microsoft/msodbcsql/lib64/ for Driver 13.
msodbcsqlr17.rll or msodbcsqlr13.rll The accompanying resource file for the driver library. This file is installed in [driver .so directory]../share/resources/en_US/
msodbcsql.h The header file that contains all of the new definitions needed to use the driver.

Note: You can't reference msodbcsql.h and odbcss.h in the same program.

msodbcsql.h is installed in /opt/microsoft/msodbcsql17/include/ for Driver 17 and in /opt/microsoft/msodbcsql/include/ for Driver 13.
LICENSE.txt The text file that contains the terms of the End-User License Agreement. This file is placed in /usr/share/doc/msodbcsql17/ for Driver 17 and in /usr/share/doc/msodbcsql/ for Driver 13.
RELEASE_NOTES The text file that contains release notes. This file is placed in /usr/share/doc/msodbcsql17/ for Driver 17 and in /usr/share/doc/msodbcsql/ for Driver 13.

Resource file loading

The driver needs to load the resource file to function. This file is called msodbcsqlr17.rll or msodbcsqlr13.rll depending on the driver version. The location of the .rll file is relative to the location of the driver itself (so or dylib), as noted in the previous table. As of version 17.1 the driver also attempts to load the .rll from the default directory if loading from the relative path fails. The default resource file path on Linux is /opt/microsoft/msodbcsql17/share/resources/en_US/.

Troubleshoot

If a version of the driver was previously installed and registered with unixODBC, installation might fail with an error like Installation failed, ODBC Driver $1 for SQL Server detected!. To resolve the problem, unregister that version of the driver. You can unregister drivers via the odbcinst command: odbcinst -u -d -n "ODBC Driver $1 for SQL Server. (Replace $1 with the version of the driver reported in the installation error.) If uninstall via the odbcinst command fails, you can manually remove driver sections from the odbcinst.ini file. You can find the location of the odbcinst.ini file via the command odbcinst -j.

If you're unable to make a connection to SQL Server using the ODBC driver, see the known issues article on troubleshooting connection problems.

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