Re: Arbitrary Constraints

"Tony Andrews" <andrewst_at_onetel.com> wrote in message news:1098882637.945531.272870_at_z14g2000cwz.googlegroups.com...

> The important consideration that is so often overlooked by people with
> a "developer" mindset and not a "database" mindset is that applications
> come and go, come and go, but the data is there "forever". Right now,
> everyone is re-building their old apps using Java; in 5 years time it
> may be C#.NET or some as yet unknown super-language. Also, even while
> the current UI exists, there is often a push for new alternatives:
> web-based applications, mobile phone-based applications maybe; a batch
> process that receives XML by email and populates the database;
> whatever. The more robustly constraints are enforced by the DBMS, the
> easier and less dangerous it is to allow these UI upgrades and
> alternatives.

You are right. And thanks for fleshing out the reasons for redundant rule enforcement, the ones I snipped.

I would say that it isn't just languages like Java that come and go. It's the business process itself. If you switch from warehouses to JIT, a lot of your application suite is going to have to change. But the old data is still valuable. Especially if you want to compare the cost of doing business before JIT and after JIT.

I want the data to outlast the program that wrote it. I want the data to outlast Oracle and Java. I want the data to outlast the RDM. I want the data to outlast the DVD as a medium!

"Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!. Nothing beside remains." Well, I guess there are some things that even the data won't outlast. Hey, at least it was fun trying. Received on Wed Oct 27 2004 - 15:25:41 CEST