tabularis-db2-plugin

Work in progress — this plugin is under active development. See the verification checklist below for the current status.

An IBM Db2 plugin for Tabularis, the lightweight database management tool.

This plugin enables Tabularis to connect to Db2 through ODBC, browse schemas and objects, run SQL queries, perform inline CRUD operations, and generate DDL through the Tabularis JSON-RPC plugin interface.

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Table of Contents

• Verification Checklist
• Features
• Supported Db2 Data Types
• Requirements
• Installation
  • Automatic (via Tabularis)
  • Manual Installation
• How It Works
• Supported Operations
• Building from Source
• Development
  • Docker-based Db2 Environment
• Known Limitations
• License

Verification Checklist

Feature	Status	Issue
Read table data	Verified	—
Schema & object browsing	Not yet verified	#1
Query execution	Not yet verified	#2
Insert record	Not yet verified	#3
Update record	Not yet verified	#4
Delete record	Not yet verified	#5
DDL generation	Not yet verified	#6
View support	Not yet verified	#7
Index management	Not yet verified	#8
Foreign key management	Not yet verified	#9
Routine support	Not yet verified	#10
Explain query	Verified	#11

Features

• Connection via ODBC — Connect to Db2 using host, port, database, credentials, and optional plugin settings.
• Schema & Object Browsing — List schemas, tables, columns, views, indexes, foreign keys, and routines.
• Query Execution — Run arbitrary SQL queries with pagination support.
• Inline Editing — Insert, update, and delete rows directly from the Tabularis grid.
• DDL Generation — Generate CREATE TABLE, ALTER TABLE, CREATE INDEX, and ADD FOREIGN KEY SQL.
• Modern Plugin Manifest — Uses current Tabularis plugin manifest fields including settings, modern capabilities, color/icon metadata, and connection string support.
• Modular Rust Codebase — RPC, client creation, metadata handlers, CRUD, DDL, and utilities are split into dedicated modules with unit tests.

Supported Db2 Data Types

Category	Types
Numeric	SMALLINT, INTEGER, BIGINT, DECIMAL, DECFLOAT, REAL, DOUBLE
String	CHAR, VARCHAR, CLOB, GRAPHIC, VARGRAPHIC, DBCLOB
Date/Time	DATE, TIME, TIMESTAMP
Binary	BLOB, BINARY, VARBINARY
Other	XML, JSON

Requirements

This plugin uses the odbc-api crate and requires a working Db2 ODBC driver on the host system.

Typical requirement:

• IBM Db2 ODBC driver installed
• ODBC driver manager available on the OS
• network connectivity to the Db2 server

You can configure the driver name from Tabularis through the plugin settings.

Installation

Automatic (via Tabularis)

Once the plugin is packaged and published in a registry-compatible format, it can be installed through the Tabularis plugin UI.

Manual Installation

1. Build the plugin in release mode:

cargo build --release

2. Copy tabularis-db2-plugin (or tabularis-db2-plugin.exe on Windows) and manifest.json into the Tabularis plugins directory:

OS	Plugins Directory
Linux	~/.local/share/tabularis/plugins/db2/
macOS	~/Library/Application Support/com.debba.tabularis/plugins/db2/
Windows	%APPDATA%\com.debba.tabularis\plugins\db2\

3. Restart Tabularis.

Local Sync Helper

A convenience script is provided to build and copy the plugin into the local Tabularis plugins directory:

./sync.sh

How It Works

The plugin is a standalone Rust binary that communicates with Tabularis through JSON-RPC 2.0 over stdio:

1. Tabularis spawns the plugin process.
2. Requests are sent as newline-delimited JSON-RPC messages to the plugin stdin.
3. The plugin opens Db2 ODBC connections on demand and writes JSON-RPC responses to stdout.

The code is intentionally split by responsibility:

• src/main.rs — request loop and dispatch
• src/client.rs — ODBC connection string construction and query execution
• src/handlers/metadata.rs — schemas, tables, columns, views, indexes, FKs, routines
• src/handlers/query.rs — connection test, query execution, explain plan
• src/handlers/crud.rs — insert, update, delete
• src/handlers/ddl.rs — SQL generation helpers
• src/utils/ — pure helpers with unit tests

Supported Operations

Method	Description
initialize	Loads plugin settings sent by Tabularis
test_connection / ping	Verifies Db2 connectivity
get_databases	Returns the current server/database identity
get_schemas	Lists Db2 schemas
get_tables	Lists base tables in the selected schema
get_columns	Returns column metadata for a table or view
get_foreign_keys	Lists foreign keys for a table
get_indexes	Lists indexes for a table
get_views	Lists views in the selected schema
get_view_definition	Returns the stored view definition
get_view_columns	Returns column metadata for a view
get_routines	Lists routines in the selected schema
get_routine_parameters	Returns routine parameters
get_routine_definition	Returns the stored routine body when available
execute_query	Runs SQL with pagination for SELECT / WITH queries
explain_query	Returns the DB2 execution plan tree by reading explain tables
insert_record	Inserts a row
update_record	Updates a row by primary key column
delete_record	Deletes a row by primary key column
get_schema_snapshot	Returns all tables with columns and foreign keys
get_all_columns_batch	Returns all column metadata for a schema
get_all_foreign_keys_batch	Returns all FK metadata for a schema
get_create_table_sql	Generates CREATE TABLE SQL
get_add_column_sql	Generates ALTER TABLE ... ADD COLUMN SQL
get_alter_column_sql	Generates ALTER TABLE ... ALTER/RENAME COLUMN SQL
get_create_index_sql	Generates CREATE INDEX SQL
get_create_foreign_key_sql	Generates FK DDL
drop_index	Executes DROP INDEX
drop_foreign_key	Executes ALTER TABLE ... DROP FOREIGN KEY

Building from Source

Prerequisites

• Rust (edition 2021)
• Db2 ODBC driver installed locally

Build

cargo build --release

The binary will be available at:

target/release/tabularis-db2-plugin

Development

Docker-based Db2 Environment

A docker-compose.yml is provided to spin up a local IBM Db2 Community Edition instance for development and integration testing.

Prerequisites

• Docker (or Podman with the docker CLI alias)
• IBM Data Server Driver for ODBC and CLI (clidriver) installed on the host and registered in /etc/odbcinst.ini

Installing the IBM clidriver on Linux:

curl -fSL https://public.dhe.ibm.com/ibmdl/export/pub/software/data/db2/drivers/odbc_cli/linuxx64_odbc_cli.tar.gz \
  -o /tmp/clidriver.tar.gz
sudo mkdir -p /opt/ibm
sudo tar xf /tmp/clidriver.tar.gz -C /opt/ibm
echo -e "[Db2]\nDescription = IBM Db2 ODBC Driver\nDriver = /opt/ibm/clidriver/lib/libdb2o.so" \
  | sudo tee /etc/odbcinst.ini

Start, seed, and manage the test database

A helper script handles the full lifecycle:

# Start the container and seed TEST_SCHEMA with fixtures
./scripts/setup-test-db.sh

# Check container health and seed status
./scripts/setup-test-db.sh status

# Stop and remove the container (including volumes)
./scripts/setup-test-db.sh teardown

The first start can take a couple of minutes while Db2 initialises. The script waits up to 300 seconds and streams progress.

Connection details

Parameter	Value
Host	localhost
Port	50000
Database	TESTDB
User	db2inst1
Password	db2test123
Schema	TEST_SCHEMA

Run integration tests

Once the container is healthy:

DB2_TEST=1 cargo test --test integration -- --test-threads=1

Integration tests are gated behind the DB2_TEST environment variable so that cargo test alone only runs unit tests (no Db2 connection required).

Run Unit Tests

cargo test

Smoke Test the Plugin Process

cargo run --bin test_plugin

Manual JSON-RPC example

echo '{"jsonrpc":"2.0","method":"initialize","params":{"settings":{}},"id":1}' \
  | ./target/debug/tabularis-db2-plugin

Tech Stack

• Language: Rust (edition 2021)
• Database driver: odbc-api
• Serialization: serde + serde_json
• Protocol: JSON-RPC 2.0 over stdio

Known Limitations

• The plugin requires a working Db2 ODBC driver on the host system.
• explain_query reads the DB2 explain tables (SYSTOOLS.EXPLAIN_OPERATOR, EXPLAIN_STREAM, EXPLAIN_STATEMENT) to build a plan tree; these tables must exist (see CALL SYSPROC.SYSINSTALLOBJECTS). Some cost/row metrics depend on the DB2 edition and optimizer statistics being up to date.
• Catalog queries were designed using Db2 catalog conventions and DBeaver’s Db2 extension as a reference, but they should still be validated against the specific Db2 edition/version you target.
• get_databases is intentionally conservative and currently returns the active server/database identity instead of enumerating every possible database on an instance.

License

Apache License 2.0