Re: RM and abstract syntax trees

From: Bob Badour <bbadour_at_pei.sympatico.ca>
Date: Wed, 31 Oct 2007 11:51:16 -0300
Message-ID: <4728966a$0$14853$9a566e8b@news.aliant.net>

Marshall wrote:

> On Oct 30, 5:59 pm, Bob Badour <bbad..._at_pei.sympatico.ca> wrote:
>

>>Marshall wrote:
>>
>>>On Oct 30, 10:39 am, Bob Badour <bbad..._at_pei.sympatico.ca> wrote:
>>
>>>>I would like to see more heavy thinkers thinking about 6NF.
>>
>>>You've hinted at this idea before. I make no claims about
>>>being a heavy thinker, but I've generally found your ideas
>>>to be worth pursuing. Do you have any suggestions for
>>>what I should be reading, before I start doing any
>>>thinking? :-)
>>
>>I don't know about reading but a good skim of /Temporal Data and the
>>Relational Model/ by Date, Darwen and Lorentzos might get some juices
>>flowing. And if I recall correctly Fabian may have had a word or two to
>>say in /Practical Issues.../ Frankly, I don't know whether anyone else
>>has even looked at 6NF.
>>
>>6NF has apparent utility for temporal data,

>
> I gotta read that "Temporal Data" book, dagnabbit.
> I despair that I am such a slow reader.
>
>

>>and I think it seems to have
>>utility for partially known data.

>
> Ha! We've had that conversation before. And in fact
> after an exuberant conversation or two (ahem)
> you've convinced me that I need to look at
> that more closely.
>
>
>

>>At the same time, current syntaxes
>>seem a little awkward when working with 6NF. The question is: What
>>short-hands would facilitate working with 6NF data? What is the
>>significance, if any, of those short-hands?

>
> I am reminded of David's "curious notation" thread (was it?)
> from a few months ago. But I'm deferring thinking too hard
> about that for now.
>
> I have this idea of developing a suite of queries to use to test
> out various syntaxes. In addition to SQL-inspired queries,
> I'm interested in culling FOL formulas from logic books.
> Although I notice that, for example, the notation of logic
> is optimized for the case that logicians have, which is
> expressing formulas for no particular domain, whereas
> we developers have an actual domain, with a great deal
> of specificity. I have yet to see a predicate in a logic
> book called "Customers" or "Employees"! :-)

Indeed. Apparently, Socrates was neither an employee nor a customer. Received on Wed Oct 31 2007 - 09:51:16 CDT