Editing Call Level Interface (section)

{{Infobox technology standard
| title             = Call Level Interface
| status            = Published
| year_started      = {{Start date and age|1992}}
| version           =
| version_date      =
| organization      = [[The Open Group]]
| authors           = [[SQL Access Group]], [[X/Open]], [[The Open Group]]
| related_standards = [[International Organization for Standardization|ISO]]/[[International Electrotechnical Commission|IEC]] 9075-3:2003
| abbreviation      = CLI
| domain            = [[Application programming interface]]s
| website           = {{URL|https://publications.opengroup.org/c451}}
}}
The '''Call Level Interface''' ('''CLI''' or '''SQL/CLI''') is an [[application programming interface]] (API)<ref>{{cite book|title=Technical Standard - Data Management: SQL Call Level Interface (CLI)|date=1995|publisher=X/Open Company Ltd., U.K.|isbn=1-85912-081-4|page=1|chapter=Chapter 1}}</ref> and software standard to embed Structured Query Language ([[SQL]]) code in a host program<ref>{{cite book|last1=Stephens|first1=Ryan|last2=Plew|first2=Ron|last3=Jones|first3=Arie|title=Sams Teach Yourself SQL|year=2011|publisher=Pearson Education|isbn=978-0672335419|page=349|edition=5th}}</ref> as defined in a joint standard by the [[International Organization for Standardization]] (ISO) and [[International Electrotechnical Commission]] (IEC).<ref>{{cite web|title=ISO/IEC 9075-3:2003|url=http://www.iso.org/iso/iso_catalogue/catalogue_ics/catalogue_detail_ics.htm?csnumber=34134|publisher=ISO|accessdate=13 December 2014}}</ref> The Call Level Interface defines how a program should send [[SQL queries]] to the [[database management system]] (DBMS) and how the returned [[recordset]]s should be handled by the application in a consistent way. Developed in the early 1990s, the API was defined only for the programming languages [[C (programming language)|C]] and [[COBOL]].

The interface is part of what [[The Open Group]], publishes in a part of the [[X/Open#Output|X/Open Portability Guide]], termed the Common Application Environment, which is intended to be a wide standard for programming open applications, i.e., applications from different programming teams and different vendors that can interoperate efficiently. SQL/CLI provides an international standard implementation-independent CLI to access SQL databases. [[Client–server model|Client–server]] tools can easily access databases through [[dynamic-link libraries]] (DLL). It supports and encourages a rich set of client–server tools.

The most widespread use of the CLI standard is the basis of the [[Open Database Connectivity]] (ODBC) specification, which is widely used to allow applications to transparently access database systems from different vendors.  ODBC incorporates features from both the ISO and X/Open standards. Examples of languages that support Call Level Interface are ANSI C, [[C Sharp (programming language)|C#]], [[Visual Basic .NET]] (VB.NET), [[Java (programming language)|Java]], [[Pascal (programming language)|Pascal]], and [[Fortran]].<ref>{{cite book|last1=Stephens|first1=Ryan|last2=Plew|first2=Ron|last3=Jones|first3=Arie|title=Sams Teach Yourself SQL|year=2011|publisher=Pearson Education|isbn=978-0672335419|page=351|edition=5th}}</ref>