Chapter 10. Database Storage Using SQLite3

WHAT YOU WILL LEARN IN THIS CHAPTER

  • How to use the SQLite3 database in your Xcode project

  • How to create and open a SQLite3 database

  • How to use the various SQLite3 functions to execute SQL strings

  • How to use bind variables to insert values into a SQL string

  • How to bundle a pre-built SQLite database with your application

For simple applications, you can write the data you want to persist to a simple text file. For more structured data, you can use a property list. For large and complex data, it is more efficient to store them using a database. The iPhone comes with the SQLite3 database library, which you can use to store your data. With your data stored in a database, your application can populate a Table view or store a large amount of data in a structured manner.

Note

Besides using SQLite for data storage, developers can also use another framework for storage – Core Data. Core Data is part of the Cocoa API, which was first introduced in the iPhone SDK 3.0. It is basically a framework for manipulating data without worrying about the details of storage and retrieval. Core Data is beyond the scope of this book.

This chapter shows you how to use the embedded SQLite3 database in your applications.

USING SQLITE3

To use a SQLite3 database in your application, you first need to add the libsqlite3.dylib library to your Xcode project. Use the following Try It Out to find out how. You will need to download the code files indicated for this and the rest of the ...

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