> With Firebird embedded can I safely access the same DB from multiple
> sources if all sources but one are read only?
>

There is no such thing as a 'read only' source. You can make an entire
database read only to place it on a CDROM etc, or you can use a read
only transaction, but IIRC this still has to make changes such as
updating the transaction number. It may even have to perform garbage
collection but not too sure there.

But I am not sure whether you understand why it is called embedded.
All embedded has is a Superserver but it is packed inside a single
DLL. The reason two processes can not connect to the same embedded
database is that the DLL would be loaded into both processes and you
would end up having effectively two database engine instances messing
around with the same database. I imagine this would cause all sorts of
exciting fireworks and corruption. Hopefully (and what I suspect), it
will simply refuse to make the second connection.

If you are accessing the database from multiple processes, you need to
install either Superserver or Classic (not embedded), period.

Adam