Re: foundations of relational theory?

"Marshall Spight" <mspight_at_dnai.com> wrote in message news:1Ypmb.23974$HS4.92369_at_attbi_s01...
> "Tony Gravagno" <g6q3x9lu53001_at_sneakemail.com.invalid> wrote in message
news:dvh0pvo70vrue56jma8gkjotmnu9gm8vtu_at_4ax.com...
> >
> >
> > This must sound horrifying to you relational guys, but again, we don't
> > view the system primarily as a database with applications supporting
> > it. We view the application as a having the database as one of its
> > components - unless the application needs a reference in the
> > dictionary it doesn't get one.
>
> Hypothesis: PICK systems work well for application development
> because of excellent application development tools and tight
> integration between the application language and the DBMS.
> Agility is enhanced by the fact that some of the more complex
> possibilities for data models, such as many-to-many relationships,
> are simply excluded. In contrast, SQL DBMSs, while having a superior
> theoretical basis and a data model that can handle arbitrarily complex
> relationships, are hampered by having no standardized application
> builders or tools. In addition, SQL is particularly hampered
> by the fact that its core data structure, the multiset, has no
> corresponding entity in popular programming languages, causing
> a huge conceptual gap, or "impedence mismatch" between DBMS
> and application languages.
>
> I'm not saying this is true or not, but it seems consistent with
> what I've read in this thread. Anyone care to critique?
>
> BTW, if my hypothesis holds, it suggests (to me, anyway)
> that the right way to respond is to try to understand the
> best of each; the benefits of RAD that come with good
> tools and integration in PICK land and the superior
> theoretic foundation that relational (the
> "inspiration for SQL" :-) has.
>
> Anyone care to critique?

The hypothesis that data dependence causes greater agility is flawed. I have established previously that logically unimportant physical changes in Pick data fundamentally alter the meaning of existing AQL queries.

In my experience, Pickies lack the cognitive ability to recognize the logical changes even after someone points them out to them. They write the query, congratulate themselves on how easy and natural it was, and totally ignore whether the query asks the correct question. This does not give me much confidence in the pick based systems out there. Received on Sat Oct 25 2003 - 15:31:03 CEST