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OLE DB Supportability Guidelines

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The OLE DB Driver for SQL Server, or SQL Server Native Client OLE DB Provider, used to connect to SQL Server 2005, 2008, 2008 R2, and SQL Server 2012, has gone out of mainstream support on 7/11/2017. However, Microsoft continues to support OLE DB Driver for SQL Server for workloads targeting SQL Server 2012.

Refer to the following guidelines when opening support requests with Microsoft Support for OLE DB, as shipped with SQL Server Native Client 11:

  • SQL Server 2012 is now in Extended Support, as detailed in the SQL Server 2012 support policy. The same support lifecycle is applicable to OLE DB in SNAC11/SQLNCLI11. Additional information can be found in the SNAC Lifecycle Explained
  • For OLE DB scenarios where the driver is targeting versions of SQL Server newer than SQL Server 2012 (or version 11), support requests can be opened and will be investigated. For such requests, the following guidelines apply:
    • If the user is not experiencing any blocking issues, our recommendation is to continue using OLE DB Driver for SQL Server.
    • If there is a blocking issue with the driver, our recommendation is to experiment using the SQL Server ODBC driver. Driver issues observed when using SQL Server versions released after SQL Server 2012 will not be addressed at this moment.
    • If an application depends on SQL Server database features that were released after SQL Server 2012, such as Multisubnetfailover, Transparent Network IP Resolution, Always Encrypted, Azure AD Authentication, Bulk Copy and Table Value Parameters, our recommendation is to experiment with the ODBC SQL Server driver.
  • The latest version of OLE DB Driver for SQL Server can be downloaded from the Microsoft SQL Server 2012 Native Client package. This was last updated in the latest servicing update on May 2016.

The supportability of OLE DB Driver for SQL Server is still a priority for the SQL Server engineering team, and we will continue to work on ensuring customers are successful in this connectivity option. Further updates will be published in the SQL Server Release Services blog directly by the engineering team.

SQL Server Engineering Team

Comments

  • Anonymous
    November 01, 2017
    This is great news. Do you have any more details on when the new version of SNAC will be released ideally which month in Q1 2018?We tried to use Always Encrypted in SQL2016 and moved over to ODBC 13 but hit a load of issues. I know this wont be in the initial release of SNAC but some a roadmap overview for it would be really useful if you have one?
    • Anonymous
      December 13, 2017
      The post on undeprecated OLE DB will be updated as we get closer to a release. Please stay tuned to https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/sqlnativeclient/2017/10/06/announcing-the-new-release-of-ole-db-driver-for-sql-server/ For the 1st release we'll only support multi-subnet and what SNAC 11 provided. So, the new release of OLE DB will not support Transparent Network IP Resolution, Always Encrypted, Azure AD Authentication, Bulk Copy and Table Value Parameters to begin with. We're collecting feedback/scenarios on what to ad next based on customer priority, and I'd like to get your detailed feedback please.