http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?
url=/library/en-us/odbc/htm/odch21bpr_11.asp

the url above has a reference to the SQLTables function
that Sandy was asking about. I also was wondering why
support for these function wasn't included in the ODBC.NET
Data Provider. The GetSchemaTable function in the
OdbcDataReader class requires that a query be submitted
first. In previous versions of ODBC, you could call
SQLTables to get a list of tables and views in a database
without having to submit any queries.

The SQLColumns function would return column attributes in
a similar manner but this too is missing from the ODBC.NET
Data Provider API.