Call it what you will; an interface, a library, metadata, a gate keeper, or a manager. We call it the Data Selections Framework (DSF). DSF sits between your database and any other product needing access to your database.

This includes reporting tools, spreadsheets, a custom developed program or anything else you can think of. Any module, regardless of its source, communicates with your database through a data source.

A data source is nothing more than a packaged query.

DSF creates the SQL query from the user’s selections and packages it as a database view. The view can then be used as the data source for anything that needs data.

Of course! DSF will work with any tool that needs to access the database.