Re: SQL For Smarties 3rd Edition - ATTN Joe Celko

David Cressey wrote:
> "paul c" <toledobythesea_at_dbms.yuc> wrote in message
> news:2QT1h.237766$R63.135766_at_pd7urf1no...
> > paul c wrote:
> > > David Cressey wrote:
> > ...
> > > By way of analogy, I was looking at some javascript the other day and
> > > noticed a very terse loan payment calculation. As I couldn't remember
> > > much of amortization theory I took a quick look at various web pages
> > > that calculate various loan values. It was clear from some of the
> > > elaborate coding in several of them that their authors didn't remember
> > > any theory either and those sites had paid much more for their web pages
> > > than they needed to.
> >
> > Sorry, whenever I post much it seems that the traffic here dies down for
> > a few days. (No idea why, but I'm good at emptying rooms too, without
> > any exertion. Maybe I stink.)
> >
> > Anyway, I thought I might add that part of the above cost is trying to
> > decide whether the code is right in some sense. The terse,
> > non-iterative example I saw could be seen to be right (as far as
> > javascript's use of binary floating point would allow) in a few seconds
> > of inspection by comparison with the nice little re-hash of how (1+i)
> > raised to some power I saw at another site, even by a
> > exec/non-programmer (at least some execs I've met) whereas it was up for
> > grabs whether any two programmers could agree what the other iterative
> > versions were trying to do.
> >
> > Rather than javascript analogies, I think it would be helpful for this
> > group to maybe put up some database examples of how seemingly simple
> > appl'n problems can benefit from theory. Perhaps such would be useful
> > as pointers when naive questions are posted by newcomers. I've never
> > been much good at abstracting but I remember carrying around a few
> > canonical examples from various fields in my head that helped me when I
> > was stuck, even though they didn't directly apply to the problem.
> >
> > Into the plonk on Hallow'een, just musing, so I won't worry if nobody
> > thinks much of the idea.
> >
> >
>
> I periodically direct newbies to "database answers". They have over 200
> models over there, free for the browsing.
> Everything from lending library to order processing. Are their models the
> best? I'm not sure, but they look pretty good on first inspection. Of
> course, examples aren't theory.
>
> The best low level theory for newbie database designers is over at the U
> Texas IT department. I also send newbies there.
> It's got a few errors in it, IMO. But over all, it's a better job of
> presenting the theory in a nutshell than I would have done.
>
> I think the biggest problem faced by newbies is that they've never seen a
> database that didn't suck.
>
>
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>
> > p

The URL for the Texas University is

http://www.utexas.edu/its/windows/database/datamodeling/rm/overview.html Received on Wed Nov 01 2006 - 21:32:33 CET