Re: 3vl 2vl and NULL

David Cressey wrote:
> "dawn" <dawnwolthuis_at_gmail.com> wrote in message
> news:1133996383.339868.79430_at_g49g2000cwa.googlegroups.com...
>
> > I'm happy to be called a Pickie, but I'll confess I've only been in
> > management in the Pick world.
>
> That might explain why you like it,

Yup -- better quality software using fewer resources (time, dollars, hardware/disk/memory, and people) -- a software development manager's goal, right?

> but cannot explain why.

That's what I've been trying to figure out. The RM is a nice, tight mathematical model where Pick had no intentional mathematical model behind it and might be considered a mess compared to the RM. So think how frustrating it was for me when I first looked at Pick and said "That is NOT a DBMS" only to learn that it was such a big bang for the buck environment that I would not give another thought to migrating a team to the RM until it could be as productive. I'm trying to find out what is wrong with the theory that makes the practice not align with it.

>
>
> > They might have adopted me by now, but
> > I'm only willing to claim expertise in CICS COBOL (and maybe Fortran
> > and Java, plus IMS, Oracle, and MySQL, and I guess a few more). I
> > think Mike might be a real Pickie, however.
>
> However, when you claim expertise in Oracle, and then say that you've met
> with disappointing results in your use of Oracle, that leaves open the
> question of whether or not the mismatch between Oracle and you was due to
> real defects in Oracle, or some other cause.

I'm certain there were many causes. I know of excellent software that uses Oracle as a DBMS. But my disappointment is related to relative productivity across the board with software development, business intelligence, querying, etc.

>
> As Frank has said, even someone working with a shifting spanner (which I
> understand to mean "adjustable wrench") can work in the best possible way.
> >
>
> > IBM U2 (IBM's Pick products) suggest significant annual growth, but I
> > don't know if it is from "the outside" or from ports from other Pick
> > products.
>
> When it catches up to DB2, let me know.

If you were to look at the dollars spent on U2 and the dollars spent on DB2, ... I'm certain there are many more features in DB2, and I respect the product (without having used it in any production environment) but it is SQL-based which might explain why I suspect suspect that if we could have a database-shootout for use in software development, U2 just might win.

> > And I probably write a lot because as one of my mentors said (who a
> > decade later become my employee) "You sure do type fast, but girls do.
> > That's why they make good secretaries." (He was explaining why I wrote
> > code faster than he did.) Cheers! --dawn
>
> Which do you do faster... typing or thinking?

Nasty. If you notice some flawed logic in my writing, please do not hesitate to bring it to my attention. I recognize that I do make statements of opinion where I ensure the reader can tell they are opinions. I do not always back up every opinion with a complete formal argument. Notice that I am aware that I still have a gap to cover -- the theory does not seem to align with what I have experienced. I continue to practice and experiment in s/w dev to see if my experience is flawed, and I continue to investigate theory to see if my understanding of the theory or application thereof is flawed. So, what is your beef with my "thinking"? I would like to rectify it. Cheers! --dawn Received on Thu Dec 08 2005 - 16:21:33 CET