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Client-only installs

In the past, it was assumed that just copying fbclient.dll and the runtimes to the system directory was enough to get a remote client set up to connect to Firebird. It worked for some situations, i.e., where the presence of the C/C++ runtimes was normal and the location was standard.

Now, with Firebird 2.1 and higher and the more pervasive changes in the Microsoft platform rules, more care must be taken.

The option to use the client-only install option in the binary installer kit might be the better approach to take if you are not too concerned about a private assembly. It will take care of writing a Registry entry to inform the system where to look for components that applications might need and of locating them in the correct relative locations; it can also be set to write a "Borland-compatible" client dll and, optionally, give it the legacy name gds32.dll.

The firebird.msg file

Each release of the client library contains the compiled message text corresponding to exception codes that its matching Firebird server returns to the client application via the Error Status array. When the client application is using the correct version of fbclient.dll, the client does not need a local copy of firebird.msg.

However, the client library does not contain any text for error messages output to the console by the Firebird command-line utilities distributed with the releases (gbak, isql, etc.). The texts for those messages live only in firebird.msg. If any of those utilities is to be used from a client, a local copy of firebird.msg is required. The symptom of a missing, wrongly placed or outdated firebird.msg file on a client that needs it is an error message of the kind Cannot format message..

Other libraries or files needed by clients

Client-only installations do not need any other components from the Firebird distribution. However, don't forget those MSVC runtimes!

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