Re: The fable of DEMETRIUS, CONSTRAINTICUS, and AUTOMATICUS

From: Marshall Spight <mspight_at_dnai.com>
Date: Sat, 23 Oct 2004 19:15:14 GMT
Message-ID: <55yed.236929$wV.220575@attbi_s54>

"Laconic2" <laconic2_at_comcast.net> wrote in message news:DYednYAjT-8hB-fcRVn-vQ_at_comcast.com...
>
> > As far as how it *ought* to be done, I claim the catalog should be
> > the definitive source of truth, and the DDL should be syntactic
> > sugar for manipulating the catalog. It's conceptually simpler that
> > way.
>
> Can you really build a DBMS that way?

Why wouldn't you be able to?

I mean, for the catalog to be useful, it has to be correct. For it to be fully useful, it has to be complete. If it's correct and complete, why wouldn't it be definitive? Why have the *transient* DDL be definitive? The meta-state is persistent, right?

Another line of thinking: the non-meta data is data just as much as the meta-data is. For non-meta data, we have the actual contents of the tables as the definitive source of truth. We *could* instead propose that the DML is the definitive source of truth. The contents of the table would be merely advisory; when we wanted to *really* operate on the data, we'd manipulate insert statements. RAA.

Marshall Received on Sat Oct 23 2004 - 14:15:14 CDT