Open Database Connectivity. Released in 1992, a library of standardized data access functions that gives programmers a way to access and manipulate data in a variety of data sources. Interfaces include Visual Basic, Visual C++, SQL, and the ODBC driver pack contains drivers for the Access, Paradox, dBase, Text, Excel, and Btrieve databases. An application can submit statements to ODBC using the ODBC flavor of SQL, and ODBC then translates these to whatever flavor the database understands. ODBC is based on Call-Level Interface and was defined by the SQL Access Group.