C# Signature:

    [DllImport("odbc32.dll",CharSet=CharSet.Ansi)]
    static extern short SQLTables(IntPtr StatementHandle,
            string CatalogName, short NameLength1,
            string SchemaName,  short NameLength2,
            string TableName,   short NameLength3,
            string TableType,   short NameLength4);

VB Signature:

TODO.

User-Defined Types:

    // flags for null-terminated string
    const short SQL_NTS         = (-3);

    // FreeStmt() options
    const int  SQL_CLOSE        = 0;
    const int  SQL_DROP         = 1;
    const int  SQL_UNBIND       = 2;
    const int  SQL_RESET_PARAMS = 3;

Alternative Managed API:

ODBC ADO.NET does not support a database independent way to retrieve the tables in a database. That is probably the only excuse to be calling this ODBC C API.

Notes:

Resulting table has prefined columns:

    string table_cat   = cmd.GetFieldValue(1); //database name
    string table_schem = cmd.GetFieldValue(2); //table owner
    string table_name  = cmd.GetFieldValue(3); //table name
    string table_type  = cmd.GetFieldValue(4); //"TABLE","VIEW" or "SYNONYM"
    string remarks     = cmd.GetFieldValue(5);

Tips & Tricks:

Microsoft access ODBC driver only likes it if the first two parameters are NULL since the tablequalifier and tableowner don't apply to MDB files. Also, SYNONYMs are MSAccess linked tables.

Sample Code:

    void GetTables()
    {
        drop();
        if (!isOK(SQLAllocStmt(connectionHandle, out statementHandle)))
            throw new Exception("Failed to allocate statement.");
        if (!isOK(SQLTables(statementHandle,
            null,
            SQL_NTS,
            null,
            SQL_NTS,
            null,
            SQL_NTS,
            "TABLE,VIEW,SYNONYM",
            SQL_NTS)))
        {
            throw new Exception(GetError());
        }
    }

    void drop()
    {
        if (statementHandle.ToInt32()!=0)
        {
            SQLFreeStmt(statementHandle, SQL_DROP);
        }
        statementHandle = IntPtr.Zero;
    }