Connecting to SQLServer from a Unix environment is non-trivial, if you don't have an ODBC engine. The way some people (like me, on a Solaris platform) do it is to use FreeTDS and pretend it is a Sybase database (I guess SQLServer is still sort of Sybase-like under the covers) using DBD::Sybase. Anyway, Super Search is your friend -- there are several good nodes on this topic.

Accessing Microsoft SQL Server from Linux using DBD::Sybase is probably a good place to start.