User Programmatic Interface

In computing, the User Programmatic Interface (UPI), also known as the User Program Interface, consists of a set of C-language software APIs which provide the lowest-level API-based interface to the Oracle database.

Overview
UPI offers a procedural API for not only performing certain database administration tasks (such as system startup and shutdown), but also for using PL/SQL or SQL to query, access, and manipulate data. The UPI library, an undocumented API used internally by Oracle, deals directly with the Two-Task Common (TTC) aspect of the Oracle Client software stack.

UPI-based applications
Several Oracle database applications depend on UPI, including:


 * Oracle Forms
 * SQL*Plus (also uses OCI)
 * Oracle Corporation's data-import and -export (IMP/EXP) utilities

UPI-Based Libraries
Several libraries depend on UPI, including:


 * Oracle's FormsAPI
 * The Oracle Call Interface Library
 * Oracle's SQLLIB (used by Oracle's Embedded SQL Precompilers)