Over that last few years, 20 to be precise (man that makes me feel old) I have used a really cool product to deal with the need to have a local database available to applications. Originally it was in the Laptop era with PowerBuilder, then the Mobile era with the launch of PocketBuilder for PocketPC2003/Windows Mobile, and the latest, before now, iOS. In each case I was using SAP Sybase SQLAnywhere, including Mobilink.
What has always been great is having the strength of a self tuning Enterprise Database, along with the capability to securely synchonize bi-directionally the data within the remote & consolidated databases. This is no mean feat and something that SQLAnywhere has been excelling at for years, even when it was Watcom SQL. Making it an industry leader!!
So I was really excited a month ago to be included in the news that SQLAnywhere was going to become available on Linux for ARM. This now opens the door for Developers of the ever popular low cost Raspberry Pi, which is being used more and more for embedded IoT type of stuff, to create apps that can store information from sensors etc and synchronise them back to other databases, such as SAP HANA & SAP ASE, for further analysis etc.
This was my first attempt at such an Interesting ingredient in the Pi Mix! My initial project getting the office temperature every 10 minutes
Steps...
1. Getting to grips with the Raspberry Pi Linux, Including installing Raspian and wiring up a digital temp sensor to a breakout breadboard
2. Installing SQLAnywhere on the Pi & my Macbook (in my case the mac was where I would connect remotely from and run the Mobilink Server)
3. Running SQLAnywhere on the Pi, after adding a new table in the Database to store, Datetime, Temperature
4. Having a Python scrip running to get the temperature from the sensor & write a record into the database
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NOTE Rather than repeat every step check out Eric Farrar's, (Product Manager at SAP)cool blog here to get you started and here are some useful URLs...
http://scn.sap.com/community/sql-anywhere
https://global.sap.com/campaign/ne/sybase/sql_anywhere_16_download_program/index.epx?kNtBzmUK9zU
Raspberry Pi Tutorials - Adafruit Learning Center: https://learn.adafruit.com/
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