Re: A database theory resource - ideas

Bruce C. Baker wrote:

> "Bob Badour" <bbadour_at_pei.sympatico.ca> wrote in message 
> news:SIGKh.11289$PV3.116242_at_ursa-nb00s0.nbnet.nb.ca...
> 

If it ever was what it once was, it was before my time.

> Some examples of the ("classic" or current, database-related or otherwise) > one percent that doesn't suck are ...?

For relational dbmses, look for names like: Date, Pascal, McGoveran, White, Darwen

For the physical level, look for names like: Shasha, Garcia-Molina, Ullman, Widom, Gray

Other useful names to look for include Fagin, Kent

There are other useful names but you will never find anything written by them at your local bookstore.

If you are lucky, at any given time, you might find a single copy of two or so good books on the racks buried in a sea of wasted wood pulp.

I haven't spent as much time in bookstores the last three or four years so I have no idea if any new entrants have emerged.

On the programming side of things, one can look for names like Sipser, Knuth, Dijkstra, Plauger, Cargill, Stroustrop, Maguire, Ullman again, Aho, Ritchie, Kernighan, a bunch more from both Bell Labs and Xerox PARC. While things are much better on the programming side, the signal to noise ratio is still abysmal.

>>Even as vocational training books, they suck.
>>
>>Teach fundamentals and principles. Start small and build. Anything else is
>>a waste or worse.

> 
> "We don't need no stinkin' principles. We gotta get that app out 
> /yesterday!" *Sigh*

There is one way your suggestion might have some merit: programmed learning. I vaguely recall Fabian might have once been involved in some CBT material based on the principle. The approach works great for english grammar (see _English 3200_
http://www.eric.ed.gov/sitemap/html_0900000b800c0812.html http://www.eric.ed.gov/sitemap/html_0900000b800bdd24.html), and I assume one could make it work for data management.

However, even more effective than data management, I think a course in programmed learning might work to improve logic, empiricism, overcoming cognitive pitfalls etc. Imagine a programmed course of learning that teaches the lessons taught in _Uncommon Sense_, _How We Know What Isn't So_, _A Mathematician Reads the Newspaper_, _Darwin's Dangerous Idea_, and the Sokal Affair.

Programmed learning works more on the basis of questions and answers than on examples, though, and it definitely follows the principle of start small and build. Received on Sat Mar 17 2007 - 06:09:54 CET