Re: What databases have taught me

From: Dan <guntermann_at_verizon.net>
Date: 26 Jun 2006 20:59:15 -0700
Message-ID: <1151380755.142891.197120_at_b68g2000cwa.googlegroups.com>


Bruno Desthuilliers wrote:
> Bob Badour a écrit :
> (snip)
> >
> > One might add that the 80% of complicated code Bruno saw resulted from
> > having a surfeit of structures to choose from and a paucity of available
> > manipulations in the first place.
>
> One might better not assert anything in the wild. A significant part of
> this code was in RDBMS-based, procedural apps. RM is not more of a
> silver bullet than anything else - if done wrong, then the result wrong,
> period.

Absolutely true! Relational or object-oriented, it doesn't matter, it's the thought process and ability to apply critical analysis to problems that makes or breaks the project or solves the problem in the most elegant way possible. Unfortuntely, it doesn't matter if it is RM or OO or structured programming, skills and the general level of formal training in computer science have declined, and therefore knowledgeable and truly exceptional systems and programming people seem to be becoming extinct, at least to me.

It's funny...the RM camp comes off using the exact same arguments as the formal specification movement camp; yet no one makes the connection. Formal methods and formal specifications versus other flexible frameworks and programming approaches could have just as easily been supplanted as the two warring factions. And there have been some successes with formal methods! Or better yet, whether software development is engineering, science, or art. Software engineering would have us believe its entirely about process, and not necessarily entirely about qualified people, which it refers often to in literature as cowboys or the purveyors of art. .

There is no black and white. And there is no silver bullet. That is for sure.

  • Dan
Received on Tue Jun 27 2006 - 05:59:15 CEST

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