Remove An ODBC Data Source

This document describes the process for removing the RDM Server ODBC Driver and DSN entries from the Windows registry.

When you install the CV11 ODBC driver, several settings are written to the Windows Registry. There are several ways to cleanly remove all of the entries. We will discuss each of the methods listed below.

• Instodbc utility
• ODBC manager
• Regedit

Remove Via The Instodbc Utility

You should be able to remove the ODBC driver settings from the command line. Navigate to your CV11\bin directory and issue the following command, replacing "RDS" with the DSN name used on your machine, if it is different.

instodbc -r RDS

This will remove all of the RDM Server DSNs and the RDM Server driver from your ODBC data sources.

If you have multiple data sources for RDM Server, you may run instodbc for each data source that you want to remove.

For example,

instodbc -r RDS2

This will remove all entries for RDS2 DSNs.

Remove Via The ODBC Manager

Go to the Windows Control Panel in Windows 2000 or the Administrative Tools in Windows XP and 2003 and open the Data Sources (ODBC) applet. You can browse through the DSN tabs. If there are DSNs set up to access the RDM Server, select them and press the REMOVE button to remove them from your data sources.

ODBC Data Source Administrator - User DSN

Select YES when prompted to remove the data source.

ODBC Administrator - Prompt to remove data source

Repeat this step for the other DSNs.

ODBC Data Source Administrator - System DSN

ODBC Data Source Administrator - File DSN

Under the Drivers tab, you can see if there is an RDM Server driver installed. This entry cannot be removed via this utility. It has to be removed by the Instodbc utility or directly via Regedit.

ODBC Data Source Administrator - Drivers

Remove Via Regedit

WARNING: Before you modify the registry, make sure to back up the registry, and make sure that you understand how to restore the registry if a problem occurs.

For additional information about backing up and restoring the registry, you can refer to the Microsoft KB article, Description of the Microsoft Windows registry.

Follow these steps to use the Regedit utility to remove the entries for the RDM Server ODBC driver from the Windows registry.

1. Select the Start menu and choose RUN.

2. Type in regedit and select the OK button. This will display the Registry Editor window.

You will be deleting certain keys from the registry. The basic steps described here may be repeated for each key that you need to remove. A list of the keys that should be removed is provided.

1. With the Registry Editor displayed, browse down through the registry path to the key or value to be removed.

2. Carefully select that key or value.

3. When you are sure that you have highlighted the correct key, press Del on your keyboard or Right click and select Delete.

Here is a list of the keys and values to remove. The key or value name at the end of the path may be different for your installation, if other options were specified during installation. Generally, you can view the contents of the key and see if it refers to the RDM Server. Also if one or more of these keys does not exist, it may be skipped.

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\ODBC\ODBC.INI\RDMServer

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\ODBC\ODBC.INI\ODBC Data Sources\RDMServer

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\ODBC\ODBCINST.INI\RDM Server

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\ODBC\ODBCINST.INI\ODBC Drivers\RDM Server

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\ODBC\ODBC.INI\RDMServer

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\ODBC\ODBC.INI\ODBC Data Sources\RDMServer

When you have finished editing the registry, you should be able to return to the ODBC Data Source Administrator and see no entries for RDM Server in any of the tabs.

Summary

To summarize, the CV11 ODBC installation writes to the Windows Registry and creates data sources in the ODBC Data Source Administrator. If you want to remove the ODBC driver, several steps are necessary.

1. All DSN entries for RDM Server must be removed

2. The RDM Server driver must be removed.

All of these entries may be removed in one step using the Instodbc utility that ships with Collect!. Or, the RDM Server DSN entries can be removed directly via the ODBC Data Source Administrator and the RDM Server driver may be removed using Instodbc or Regedit.

See Also

- ODBC Topics