Re: how to query the structure of a database

"Massimo Fuccillo" <mfuccillonospam_at_tiscalinetnospam.it> wrote in message news:<D8958.18173$6e5.625842_at_twister2.libero.it>...
> Hi all
>
> Is there a standard way (using SQL) to query the structure of a database?

  Has anyone ever paused for a moment, and considered how unbelievably odd   this question is? And then paused again, and reflected on the incredible fact   that this question can be answered at all, in any RDBMS? (although the details   of how you do it vary).

  Today I received a brochure in the mail for a software development conference.   Delegates will be assailed on topics like "Software Patterns: Are they   Useless?" and a couple of talks that wail endlessly about how hard it is to   reverse engineer/cross compile a Java/C++/C/COBOL/D-flat application to figure   out what it does. The conference features an endless parade of esteemed   engineers explaining why their latest methodology solves this or that problem   of software engineering.

  There is exactly one database talk. It in, a panel of genuine luminaries will   wax philosophical in public about XML and databases.

  Databases are the offensive linemen of software engineering. What databases   do is amazing (given what other software environments can manage), but about   the only time anyone notices the fact that there is (not) a DBMS there at all   is when someone tackles the quarterback/complains about peformance. When   that happens, some anonymous DBA figures out why, creates an index, and things   proceed. (For those of you in Commonwealth countries & France, databases are   the front-row forwards of software, blah blah blah. For the rest of you I   guess the best analogy is a soccer stopper).

   Grump, grump. This probably won't help anyone. Makes me feel better though,    getting it off my chest.

    KR

              Pb Received on Tue Jan 29 2002 - 06:18:13 CET