Re: choices regarding where to place code - in the database or middle tier

["Followup-To:" header set to comp.database.oracle.] On 2004-01-20, Daniel Morgan <damorgan_at_x.washington.edu> wrote:
> Joe Weinstein wrote:
>
>> However, that dbms-specific level should be as narrow and
>> controllable/switchable
>> as possible. J2EE standards help there.
>> Joe
>>
>>> Just my 2 cents
>>>
>>> Daniel
>
> I appreciate your opinion and your honesty that your perspective comes
> from selling that middle tier but I completely disagree.
>
> The 'lets push more bytes down the pipe and across all those routers'
> thinking is not going to lead to performance. You may be scalable but
> performance will suffer. And you will be no more scalable than a thinner
> client.
>
> Render under to database everything you can do in the database and let
> the middle tier do what it does best ... fail-over, load levelling, and
> serving up the front-end.

You are painting with far too broad a brush. Some of your examples below represent absurd examples of middle-tier database processing. They would (and do) horrify anti-centrists as much as they do you. Some of them demonstrate that even good ideas can be poorly implemented.

>
> Try tuning all that rotten SQL coming from those fat front-ends sometime
> and you will understand why those here that have experience with
> PeopleSoft, SAP, Baan, and Siebel are remarkably unhappy.
>

-- 
The public has a right to free music. It's part of the bargain that
was originally made with musicians and publishers. It's time that the   |||
debate was shifted to reflect that. Robber Barons and their Toadies    / | \
are distracting us from the original facts of the situation.