Re: A new proof of the superiority of set oriented approaches: numerical/time serie linear interpolation

"David Cressey" <cressey73_at_verizon.net> wrote in message news:6ui_h.5979$YW4.662_at_trndny06...
>
> "Cimode" <cimode_at_hotmail.com> wrote in message
> news:1178174344.866049.272810_at_h2g2000hsg.googlegroups.com...
>> On 2 mai, 21:47, paul c <toledobythe..._at_oohay.ac> wrote:
>> > Cimode wrote:
>> >
>> > ...
>> >
>> > > Brian,
>> >
>> > > Don't you think you are overcomplicating things?
>> >
>> > I certainly do. RT isn't as complicated or subtle as this thread is
>> > making it out to be.
>> I was not thinking about *subtleness*. I am having trouble following
>> Brian's wordy line of thought. I am not sure he and I have do not
>> have the same perception of what logical and physical independence
>> is. I was also refering to terms I am not familiar with such as
>> *database state*. To me they are totally foreign to RM formal
>> theory.
>>
>> Maybe you could clarify. Thanks.
>> Regards...
>>
>> [Snipped]
>
>
> I think that "state" is a fundamental concept in computing. As such,
> Brian
> and others ought to be able to use it to communicate rather precisely,
> without needing to present a formal definition. If you know what a
> "database" is and you know what a "state" is, I think you know what a
> "database state" is.
>
> Having said that, I'll admit that I'm often lost by Brian's argument. He
> seems to be arguing that transaction atomicity is an undesirable feature
> of
> our data model. If I'm reading that right, I abandon the effort to
> understand the rest of what he's saying.
>

I'm not sure which argument you're referring to. Several have arisen. I'll try to state them consisely:

1. assignment is bad: it breaks one of Codd's rules, unless you use surrogates, which breaks another of Codd's rules. Use a set of inserts, updates, and deletes instead.
2. multiple self-joins are bad for performance: use a cursor to eliminate them and thus improve performance.
3. in a closed world, there is no such thing as "missing information."

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Received on Thu May 03 2007 - 07:30:45 CDT