Re: On view updating

"Paul" <paul_at_test.com> wrote in message news:41588aa3$0$42237$ed2e19e4_at_ptn-nntp-reader04.plus.net...
> Now suppose we don't know exactly what the firstname is, but we know it
> is definitely one of two options. We want to insert to our database the
> proposition:
>
> Employee 123 is called (John or Bill) Smith, works in department 10
> and has a salary of 10,000.
>
> But, as it doesn't fit our template, we can't. So does this mean that
> the relational model is lacking in terms of being able to store any
> expression of first-order logic?

This example is not convincing at all. People do have many aliases (self-reflecting statement!-). Put all the aliaces into a relation, which is far simpler (and, therefore, superior) to having alternative object design with complex datatype.

Perhaps, by "Employee 123 is called (John or Bill) Smith" you have meant something other than aliasing, so I misinterpreted your idea. It follows then, that the idea of complex predicates is too prone for misinterpretations, and should be abandoned altogether [at least in the trivial world of business data]. Received on Tue Sep 28 2004 - 00:08:36 CEST