The client driver APIs are modeled after Berkeley DB Java base APIs with most class names prefixed with an 'S', which stands for server. For example, the Database class is named the SDatabase class in the driver APIs. All classes in the client driver APIs are located in the com.sleepycat.client package.

In addition, the client driver provides the BdbServerConnection class, which can be used to establish a connection to a server and also serves as the starting point to everything else in the client driver APIs. For example, client environment handles are created like this:

BdbServerConnection conn = 
		BdbServerConnection.connect("localhost", 8080);
SEnvironment env = conn.openEnvironment("env", 
		new SEnvironmentConfig().setAllowCreate(true)); 

The BdbServerConnection class is not thread-safe. Furthermore, all objects created from a BdbServerConnection instance use the connection object internally. Thus, they must be accessed in the same thread as the connection object, or at least their accesses must be serialized. This rule applies recursively to handles created from environment handles (which are created from connection objects). Therefore, the entire object graph rooted at a single BdbServerConnection instance must be accessed in a single thread, or accessed serially.