Re: 2 Oracle doubts

Chuck <chuckh_at_softhome.net> wrote in message news:<Xns93D176F76B8F6chuckhsofthomenet_at_130.133.1.4>...
> gters_at_zdas.com (Gters) wrote in
> news:3f33b482$0$83915$45beb828_at_newscene.com:
>
> > In article <oprsuxo1o5r9lm4d_at_haydn>, Quarkman <quarkman_at_myrealbox.com>
> > wrote:
> >>On 25 Jul 2003 01:16:17 -0700, delavega <delapordio_at_hotmail.com>
> >>wrote:
> >>
> >>> Hi. I´m a MySql programmer, but i need make a application with
> >>> Oracle 8.1 Server. I have 2 doubts (for the moment)
> >>>
> >>> 1-Can i have a Oracle table without primary Key?
> >>
> >>Yes. But this is a *relational* database, so why you'd actually want
> >>this I can't really imagine (OK, I've seen heaps of bad applications
> >>who wouldn't know a primary key from a prune, but they're really *bad*
> >>apps.)
> >>
> >>> 2-In a sql, the date fields are with quotas ("")? Exists the
> >>> direct comparation between dates (<, >)?
> >>
> >>Get thyself to tahiti.oracle.com and start reading the documentation
> >>on issues like this. Short answer: dates need a fair bit of
> >>manipulation, but yes you can do maths with them.
> >>
> >>~QM
> >>
> > alot of packaged apps do not have any keys on thier oracle tables,
> > they do it all interanally. usually it is to hinder reverse
> > engineering of their apps, having all the relational stuff in the
> > tables gives insight into design. I have seen the internal tables of
> > a very well known and expensive enterprise package. no keys, tables
> > and columns have almost nonsense names (and in a language other than
> > english)
> >
>
> I pity the poor sap that has to manage that database ;-)
>
> I think a lot of apps are writeen this way not to prevent reverse
> engineering, but because they are written to run on every RDBMS
> imaginable. To minimize customization for each RDBMS, they bury as much
> as they can in the app. Not to mention the programmers probably have
> little specific knoweledge about individual RDBMS's.

I think you are giving far too much credit to those apps. I think they are written that way because they've been around so long, being hacked from architecture to architecture.

jg

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