Re: In an RDBMS, what does "Data" mean?

In message <ndGdnaCj0N27mTPdRVn-iQ_at_comcast.com>, Laconic2 <laconic2_at_comcast.net> writes
>
>"Anthony W. Youngman" <wol_at_thewolery.demon.co.uk> wrote in message
>news:v5os1HDGTSrAFwl8_at_thewolery.demon.co.uk...
>
>
>> PERFECT! That's a quote I would have loved to have had available to me
>> earlier :-)
>
>The thing is, I'm not satisfied with the arguments of either the pro
>relational camp or their challengers in this forum.
>
>There's clearly a lot of intelligence and erudition in here, but it seems
>to be savagely misused, on both sides of the argument.
>
>I've used the power of relational joins, ever since I was first exposed to
>the concept. And my first use involved nothing more sophisticated than
>Datatrieve and indexed files on a VAX. And the theorists in this forum who
>dismiss that as "not relational" have a fundamental synapse missing with
>regard to the connection between theory and pragma.
>
Well, think of a join, and then think of that join being along a "cascading delete" link - ie the linked table is an attribute of the master table.

In Pick, that join wouldn't be necessary, the linked table would logically and physically be part of the master table ...

And if you haven't got a cascading delete, chances are you either have a code lookup; or you're only interested in viewing fields in one table, but need the other table for certain SELECT fields. In the former case you declare a virtual field in Pick, and in the latter it may require (slightly) more effort on the part of the programmer, but a lot less effort on the part of the database...

Cheers,
Wol

-- 
Anthony W. Youngman - wol at thewolery dot demon dot co dot uk
HEX wondered how much he should tell the Wizards. He felt it would not be a
good idea to burden them with too much input. Hex always thought of his reports
as Lies-to-People.
The Science of Discworld : (c) Terry Pratchett 1999