Re: Stored fields ordered left to right

"Bob Badour" <bbadour_at_golden.net> wrote in message news:UPadnYocu4EPa5jdRVn-uw_at_golden.net...
> "Adrian Kubala" <adrian_at_sixfingeredman.net> wrote in message
> news:slrnc09prd.2rt.adrian_at_sixfingeredman.net...
> > Dawn M. Wolthuis <dwolt_at_tincat-group.com> schrieb:
> > > So, where I have seen no instances that cannot be modeled equally well
> > > with functions as with relations, I have seen many times when a
> > > flexible function is a much better way to model the propositions.
> > >
> > > Take some example propositions:
> > >
> > > Hope has a cat named Geneva and a dog named Rugby.
> > > Shanna has no pets, but did have a dog named Monte who died in 2002.
> > >
> > > Given only these statements, I might immediately come up with
something
> like
> > > this:
> > >
> > > a function named PEOPLE and the assignment of an arbitrary (or
> sequentially
> > > assigned) id for each person
> > > PEOPLE("12345") = { "Hope", { ("cat", "Geneva", NULL) , ("dog",
"Rugby",
> > > NULL)} }
> > > PEOPLE("12346") = ( "Shanna", { ("dog", "Monte", "2002") } }
> >
> > This is not modeling, because all you've done is associate some lists
> > with each person, without any formal way to reason about what the lists
> > MEAN. I could just as well "model" the first proposition as:
> >
> > CATS("Geneva") = { {("owner", "Hope")} } etc.
> > or even
> > PEOPLE("12345") = { "has a cat named Geneva and a dog named Rugby" }
> >
> > Any extra flexibility you get is by delegating more of the
> > semantics/interpretation to the clients of the database.
>
> Since the "lists" are unnamed, one wonders how one does anything with
them.
> I see no flexibility in Dawn's idiocy. Pick lacks flexibility. It is a
> chained straightjacket with an anchor attached.
>

You might take note that I stated that I was leaving out the metadata, although I don't usually do that. The attributes are also unnamed in my message, but not in a full-blown model, just like the attributes that are associated with each other are also named as a tuple in the actual model.

Just because you see no flexibility and continue to let me know regularly that I am an idiot (even though your statements likely tell readers more about you than about me -- you might consider seeing a shrink to find out why you feel a need to belittle me and others you have never met, in this fashion), I see no logic in your counter arguement here into which I can sink my teeth. I do gather, however, from your comments that you have some experience with the Nelson-Pick model or an actual PICK implementation. If so, please let me know what in your experience has shown inflexibility and if not, please let me know what information you have that leads you to believe that PICK is a "straightjacket"....

Thanks. --dawn Received on Thu Jan 15 2004 - 03:24:24 CET