The physicalname() function returns the physical name of a global field, the physical name of a table, or the column name of a field in a SQL table.
physicalname(resource)
• resource – The resource whose physical name is being retrieved.
The physicalname() function is useful when you are using pass-through SQL in your application. The names of tables and columns can be retrieved and used in the pass-through SQL without requiring that you hard-code them.