On Unix, you configure DSN entries directly in the odbc.ini file. Here is a typical odbc.ini file that configures myodbc8w (Unicode) and myodbc8a (ANSI) as DSN names for Connector/ODBC 8.4:

;
;  odbc.ini configuration for Connector/ODBC 8.4 driver
;

[ODBC Data Sources]
myodbc8w     = MyODBC 8.4 UNICODE Driver DSN
myodbc8a     = MyODBC 8.4 ANSI Driver DSN

[myodbc8w]
Driver       = /usr/local/lib/libmyodbc8w.so
Description  = Connector/ODBC 8.4 UNICODE Driver DSN
SERVER       = localhost
PORT         =
USER         = root
Password     =
Database     = test
OPTION       = 3
SOCKET       =

[myodbc8a]
Driver       = /usr/local/lib/libmyodbc8a.so
Description  = Connector/ODBC 8.4 ANSI Driver DSN
SERVER       = localhost
PORT         =
USER         = root
Password     =
Database     = test
OPTION       = 3
SOCKET       = 

Refer to the Section 5.2, “Connector/ODBC Connection Parameters”, for the list of connection parameters that can be supplied.

In some cases when using unixODBC, you might get this error:

Data source name not found and no default driver specified

If this happens, make sure the ODBCINI and ODBCSYSINI environment variables are pointing to the right odbc.ini file. For example, if your odbc.ini file is located in /usr/local/etc, set the environment variables like this:

export ODBCINI=/usr/local/etc/odbc.ini
export ODBCSYSINI=/usr/local/etc