Re: Multiple specification of constraints

"Bob Badour" <bbadour_at_golden.net> wrote in message news:p8CdnRvXWLRX9aLdRVn-sQ_at_golden.net...
> "Marshall Spight" <mspight_at_dnai.com> wrote in message
> news:BOD%b.67294$Xp.319435_at_attbi_s54...
> > "Dawn M. Wolthuis" <dwolt_at_tincat-group.com> wrote in message
> news:c1mimq$40n$1_at_news.netins.net...
> > > "Marshall Spight" <mspight_at_dnai.com> wrote in message
<snip>
> > > Yes, my point was that constraint checking is only part of the
picture.
> >
> > Fair enough.

>
> The part of the picture her espoused model fails at most spectacularly.
Her
> espoused model also fails spectacularly at expressibility among several
> other fundamental features of sound data management.
>

Hmmm. I'm not a mathematician. I do have a master's degree in mathematics. I don't recall stating that incorrectly, but I might have referred to the "mathematician inside me" or the "theologian inside me" or something like that. So, you can ditch that designation. It is likely that I know more mathematics than you, however, Bob, and have enough background to have a healthy disrespect for blind acceptance of mathematical correctness as the only test for solid computing solutions..

> > > > I think the idea of having it be possible to automatically replicate
> the
> > > > integrity checks on the client (or on whatever earlier tier) is the
> better
> > > > approach to pursue.
> > >
> > > Have you seen anyone try to do this? Do they end up with
OS-independent
> > > applicaxtions? DB-independent? How do they do that? I'm not
grasping
> the
> > > solution to this that includes only one set of validation
specifications
> and
> > > hosts those in a proprietary database engine with a proprietary SQL
> > > implementation. It seems that any such solution would make the
> application
> > > tightly coupled with the database implementation, right?
> >
> > The only system I've ever seen have any real success with platform
> independent
> > applications is Java. I do not consider C-style portability (i.e., spend
a
> day
> > editing header files before you can compile) to be platform
independence.
> > I suppose .Net has a shot at this same kind of independence; we'll see
how
> > Mono goes.
> >
> > But I'm not sure that DB-independence is a real thing today. By way of
> > comparison, does OS independence exist? I would say not.

>

I can understand that approach, although I would choose a language that runs in a portable virtual machine instead (Java and PICK BASIC are two such).

One does have to choose what to lock into. Web Services, for example, locks into XML and possibly SOAP (depending on your def of WS). Jini locks into Java. Locking into a hardware or OS seems like a bad plan, compared to locking into a portable VM. Then pick either a language or a database that run in a virtual machine, rather than both (if feasible) for optimal choices down the line. In part because of the brilliance of the Jini libraries, I've chosen to buckle down with Java and try to keep as much logic outside of any particular proprietary database as possible.

--dawn Received on Fri Feb 27 2004 - 17:36:08 CET