Connecting to MSSQL external server in 2019

[AlexNuta]

Hi folks,

I have a fresh Cpanel 84.0.21 over CentOS 7.7 installed on a VPS, and I'd very much like to connect to an existing Windows-based Microsoft SQL server.
I've seen that people have successfully done this, but trying to follow and piece together information, and many many hours in, I still don't have a working solution.
Earlier suggestions from 2012 have not worked with the current version of PHP (7.3)
This is as close as I have gotten:

I have seen this thread suggested as late as 2017: https://features.cpanel.net/topic/easyapache-4-pdo_dblib-mssql-support

I downloaded the Microsoft driver from here: Download Microsoft® SQL Server® ODBC Driver 1.0 for Linux from Official Microsoft Download Center
Following the instructions there I ran ./build_dm.sh
The script downloads the older 2.3.0 version of the unixODBC driver (current version 2.3.7), then unpacks and tries to configure it.
The script fails there, with :

Configuring unixODBC 2.3.0 DriverManager ... FAILED

In the installation log file I have:

./build_dm.sh: line 188: ./configure: Permission denied

Am I correct in presuming the problem is that the script doesn't have proper permissions in the /tmp/unixODBC.8750.2847.18216 (directory changes with each attempt) subdirectory where it has unpacked the files? I am running the commands as root.
Seeing as how the script unpacks these files, how would I even go about making sure the files are thereafter editable since I don't control their unpacking directly?

I am not an experienced CentOS administrator, and I'm not sure where to go from here.
Is there a relatively current howto (later than 2017) that could help me figure out how to do this?

I realize strictly speaking this is not a Cpanel issue, but as I'm trying to work with EasyApache4 I'm hoping someone can help.

It would be great if there was a step-by-step howto to get this done under CentOS/WHM/Cpanel/EasyApache.

 

[cPanelLauren]

Hello,

Microsoft has one for their driver and installing it on Linux, it can be found here: Installing the Microsoft ODBC Driver for SQL Server on Linux and macOS - SQL Server

AFAIK though PHP 7 and high don't support MSSQL but there may be some workarounds , information can be found on that and configuration as well as FreeTDS here: Testing FreeTDS for EasyApache 4

 

[AlexNuta]

Thanks for the speedy response! I appreciate that.
I saw this page before, but a CentOS process was not listed, so I assumed they were not available for it, or not compatible with it.
As I understand it, I may be able to use the Red Hat process?

Thanks also for the information on FreeTDS. I will read up on that.