Lesson 1

In this course you will learn the fundamental aspects of JDBC and get a clear understanding of how it operates. You learn how to apply the numerous features JDBC provides to large-scale projects and systems, and see how it works with other Java-based technologies such as the Java Naming and Directory Interface (JNDI), Java Server Pages (JSP), and Enterprise Java Beans (EJB).

Java Database Connectivity (JDBC) is an application programming interface (API) for the Java programming language that allows Java programs to access databases. JDBC was introduced by Sun Microsystems in the mid-1990s and has gone through several revisions and updates over the years. Here's a brief history of JDBC since its introduction:

1. 1996: The first version of JDBC was released as part of the Java Development Kit (JDK) 1.1. JDBC provided a standard way for Java programs to access relational databases such as Oracle, Sybase, and IBM DB2. JDBC 1.0 had a simple API that provided basic database connectivity functionality.
2. 1997: JDBC 1.2 was released, adding support for scrollable and updatable result sets, batch updates, and stored procedures.
3. 1998: JDBC 2.0 was released as part of the Java 2 Platform, Standard Edition (J2SE) 1.2. JDBC 2.0 introduced new features such as connection pooling, distributed transactions, and support for non-relational databases.
4. 1999: JDBC 2.1 was released, adding support for the Java Naming and Directory Interface (JNDI) and connection failover.
5. 2000: JDBC 3.0 was released as part of J2SE 1.4. JDBC 3.0 added support for rowsets, a new kind of object that provided an easy-to-use, disconnected view of a result set.
6. 2001: JDBC 3.0 was updated with support for savepoints, scrollable updateable result sets, and national character set support.
7. 2003: JDBC 4.0 was released as part of J2SE 5.0 (also known as Java 5). JDBC 4.0 introduced several new features, including automatic driver loading, annotations for mapping Java objects to database tables, and support for SQL exceptions as Java exceptions.
8. 2006: JDBC 4.0 was updated with support for SQLXML, which allowed Java programs to work with XML data stored in databases.
9. 2009: JDBC 4.1 was released as part of Java SE 7. JDBC 4.1 added several new features, including support for JDBC-ODBC bridges, national character set conversion, and support for retrieving generated keys after executing an INSERT statement.
10. 2013: JDBC 4.2 was released as part of Java SE 8. JDBC 4.2 added support for several new features, including try-with-resources statements for automatic resource management, support for the DATE, TIME, and TIMESTAMP WITH TIME ZONE data types, and support for JDBC-URLs with user-defined properties.

Since then, JDBC has continued to evolve with the Java platform, with updates being released with new versions of Java SE. Today, JDBC remains a popular way for Java developers to access databases, with many Java frameworks and tools providing JDBC support out of the box.

After completing this course, students will be able to:

1. Compose JDBC applications
2. Define JDBC-related terms
3. Describe the major components of a JDBC application
4. Describe the relationship of JDBC to Java and to database systems
5. Describe how to use JDBC in transactions
6. Describe the relationship of JDBC to J2EE technologies

JDBC allows us to write java applications with following functionalities,

1. Connect to a data source, like a database.
2. Send queries and update statements to the database.
3. Retrieve and process the results received from the database in answer to your query.

JDBC (Java DataBase Connectivity) is an important Java API that defines how a client accesses a database. JDBC is critical in building large-scale enterprise Java solutions and it is expected that you understand JDBC and its related features. You can use JDBC to perform database operations such as

1. inserting,
2. updating, and
3. creating database entities as well as
4. executing SQL queries.

Using JDBC support, you can also perform transactions on the database.

A JDBC connection is a connection to a database that uses the Java Database Connectivity (JDBC) API, which manages connecting to a database, issuing queries and commands, and handling result sets obtained from the database. A database connection is a more general term that refers to any connection to a database, regardless of the programming language or API used. In other words, a JDBC connection is a specific type of database connection that uses the JDBC API.