Re: The BOOLEAN data type

"Lauri Pietarinen" <lauri.pietarinen_at_atbusiness.com> wrote in message news:e9d83568.0304040637.705b2b6a_at_posting.google.com...
> "Bob Badour" <bbadour_at_golden.net> wrote in message
>
> > Whether he wrote anything specific to databases is unknown to me, but he
> > wrote tons of stuff applicable to databases including his most famous
stuff
> > like shortest path and critical sections/concurrency. In fact, I am sure
> > almost everything he wrote could have some relevance to database
management
> > systems, since these systems generally comprise one or more program --
among
> > other things.
>
> What I was actually wondering was how come he has not
> realised the power and relevance of relational db theory
> to the things he strives for (simplicity, fighting complexity,
> elegance etc etc).

I would say that he did not limit the utility of predicate calculus to only databases. If you start spelunking through his EWD's, you will see that he sought to prove theorems without reference to their use so that their use is not limited.

> At least
> he does not mention the theory in his keynote. Do we
> have yet another programmer, who does not understand
> databases? ;-)

He went to the trouble of saying he did not find object orientation elegant. (A condemnation that applies at least as much to using OO for programming as it does to using it for data management.) It is hopeful that he did not single out the relational model for comment.

Because he was a student of programming, perhaps, he chose not to comment on data management. Alas, we can no longer ask him.

I would never presume that E.W.Dijkstra misunderstood anything important related to computing. Received on Sat Apr 05 2003 - 09:02:47 CEST