Re: Dreaming About Redesigning SQL

"Anthony W. Youngman" <thewolery_at_nospam.demon.co.uk> wrote in message news:<qTyNfpCBNIg$EwhK_at_thewolery.demon.co.uk>...
> In article <ba87a3cf.0310031759.42dce77c_at_posting.google.com>, Seun Osewa
> <seunosewa_at_inaira.com> writes
> >Thanks for the links.
> >
> >Christopher Browne <cbbrowne_at_acm.org> wrote in message news:<blkq9n$d9puv$4_at_ID-
> >125932.news.uni-berlin.de>...
> >> There are two notable 'projects' out there:
> >>
> >> 1. There's Darwen and Date's "Tutorial D" language, defined as part
> >> of their "Third Manifesto" about relational databases.
> >>
> >> 2. newSQL <http://newsql.sourceforge.net/>, where they are studying
> >> two syntaxes, one based on Java, and one based on a
> >> simplification (to my mind, oversimplification) of SQL.
> >
> >I was able to get a pdf coy of the "Third Manifesto" article here:
> >http://citeseer.nj.nec.com/darwen95third.html
> >but the details of tutorial D seem not to be a part of that article.
> >NewSQL *might* be cool if someone found reason to use it in a DBMS.
>
> Is Darwen and Date's stuff that where they said SQL was crap. As I
> understand it, within about a year of designing SQL, at least one of
> Codd and Date said it was rubbish and tried to replace it with something
> "better".
> >
> >Sometimes I wonder why its so important to model data in the "rela-
> >tional way", to think of data in form of sets of tuples rather than
> >tables or lists or whatever. I mean, though its elegant and based
> >on mathematical principles I would like to know why its the _right_
> >model to follow in designing a DBMS (or database). The way my mind
> >sees it, should we not rather be interested in what works?
> >
> I couldn't agree more (of course I would). As I like to put it, surely
> Occam's Razor says that stuffing the four-dimensional world into a flat-
> earth database can't be the optimal solution!

That's a compelling argument to avoid pick as a flat file processor, and a strong argument for representing n-dimensional data in n-ary relations.

> The trouble with so many SQL advocates is that they are so convinced in
> the mathematical rightness of the relational model, that they forget it
> is a *model* and, as such, needs to be shown as relevant to the real
> world.

The trouble with pick/mv advocates is they are ignorant, stupid and irrational buffoons convinced in the superiority of their product in spite of all contradictory evidence. Received on Tue Oct 07 2003 - 00:03:14 CEST