Re: Date, Darwen, Pascal and the alternative to Nulls in the RM
Date: Thu, 23 Mar 2006 12:42:53 GMT
Message-ID: <hJwUf.5600$kB1.4717_at_trndny07>
"JOG" <jog_at_cs.nott.ac.uk> wrote in message news:1143088437.488504.19900_at_j33g2000cwa.googlegroups.com...
> I'm starting to believe Codd was most likely aware of these issues,
> and rather conceded to pragmatism. He realised something was afoot
> mathematically when he added column headers, which recent proponents
> tend to ignore, and similarly I imagine he knew that for the RM to
> function, nulls were going to be a necessary evil.
>
I don't think you have to imagine. One of his 12 rules called for
"systematic treatment of missing values".
That's not the same as calling for "systematic elimination of missing
values".
I find a thread of pragmatism running throughout Codd's writing. I think that if it didn't pass the "laugh test" for pragmatists, it wouldn't be where it is today. Received on Thu Mar 23 2006 - 13:42:53 CET