Is there a way to get more metadata

according to documentation the only metadata we can get with this "$fields = $this->db->field_data('table_name');"
are $field->name; $field->type;$field->max_length;$field->primary_key; but is there a way to check if a field is required or a foreign key?

thanks

This might help

It is for mySQL, so you may need to implement something else to make it work for your database.

according to documentation the only metadata we can get with this "$fields = $this->db->field_data('table_name');"
are $field->name; $field->type;$field->max_length;$field->primary_key; but is there a way to check if a field is required or a foreign key?

thanks

Yes, it will basically boil down to a manual parse of your RDBMS's "SHOW CREATE TABLE" return. And, as Kaosweaver mentions, the format here will depend on the database vendor. 

For cases where the table structure is more_or_less known, you could consider supplementing CI's metadata return with some hardcoded additions :-\