Previous sections have described
common database operations such as retrieving, inserting, updating,
and deleting data, as well as creating a database file and tables
and other objects within a database. The examples have demonstrated
how to perform these operations both asynchronously and synchronously.
As a reminder, in asynchronous execution mode, you instruct the
database engine to perform an operation. The database engine then
works in the background while the application keeps running. When
the operation finishes the database engine dispatches an event to
alert you to that fact. The key benefit of asynchronous execution
is that the runtime performs the database operations in the background
while the main application code continues executing. This is especially
valuable when the operation takes a notable amount of time to run.
On the other hand, in synchronous execution mode operations don’t
run in the background. You tell the database engine to perform an
operation. The code pauses at that point while the database engine
does its work. When the operation completes, execution continues
with the next line of your code.
A single database connection can’t execute some operations or
statements synchronously and others asynchronously. You specify
whether a
SQLConnection
operates in synchronous
or asynchronous when you open the connection to the database. If
you call
SQLConnection.open()
the connection operates
in synchronous execution mode, and if you call
SQLConnection.openAsync()
the
connection operates in asynchronous execution mode. Once a SQLConnection
instance is connected to a database using
open()
or
openAsync()
,
it is fixed to synchronous or asynchronous execution.
