steve's dataphore

  • steve dassin (4/1/2009)


    Sergiy (3/30/2009)


    Yeah, I know.

    All algorithms are built, all math tasks are solved, all music is writen, all paints are painted.

    Universal excuse for mediocre for all times.

    Well you seem to have a sense of what I'm up against! 🙂 I sure as hell could use a little help from some bright people who cynicism has totally blinded them to entertaining new ideas.

    best,

    steve

    www.beyondsql.blogspot.com

    Where is a new idea?

    _____________
    Code for TallyGenerator

  • Sergiy (4/1/2009)


    steve dassin (4/1/2009)


    Sergiy (3/30/2009)


    Yeah, I know.

    All algorithms are built, all math tasks are solved, all music is writen, all paints are painted.

    Universal excuse for mediocre for all times.

    Well you seem to have a sense of what I'm up against! 🙂 I sure as hell could use a little help from some bright people who cynicism has totally blinded them to entertaining new ideas.

    best,

    steve

    www.beyondsql.blogspot.com

    Where is a new idea?

    Thanks for bursting my balloon ;-)::-)

    Do you really think I'd be wasting my time if dataphor represented the same old, same old!:w00t:

    somewhat best,

    steve

    www.beyondsql.blogspot.com

  • steve dassin (4/1/2009)


    Thanks for bursting my balloon ;-)::-)

    Do you really think I'd be wasting my time if dataphor represented the same old, same old!:w00t:

    somewhat best,

    steve

    www.beyondsql.blogspot.com

    You did not answer the question.

    _____________
    Code for TallyGenerator

  • Sergiy (4/1/2009)


    steve dassin (4/1/2009)


    Thanks for bursting my balloon ;-)::-)

    Do you really think I'd be wasting my time if dataphor represented the same old, same old!:w00t:

    somewhat best,

    steve

    www.beyondsql.blogspot.com

    You did not answer the question.

    Ok. The new idea is actually an old idea that's never be tried. It's a relational system that most sql folks haven't gotten their head into and/or around. If you were to fork sql, redesign the language syntax, make it an algebra and bolt it into a strongly 'typed' environment where all objects are typed variables you'd be on your way to a relational system. Dataphor is an attempt for users to actually see and taste what these ideas are like in practice. To most sql experts (and most other users for that matter) these are abstract ideas that are marginalized by calling them 'theoretical' and 'academic' as opposed to practical. Dataphor is an attempt to make data management scientific and put this science in your face. 🙂

    back to best,

    steve

    www.beyondsql.blogspot.com

  • Matt Miller (3/30/2009)


    steve dassin (3/29/2009)


    Matt Miller (3/27/2009)


    I guess my first question would be - what DataPhor features can you not find elsewhere? The fact that ylou want this to run on top of a SQL Server back-end makes it sounds like you'd be comfortable with any number of the "intermediate" tools which take largely procedural code and translates/interprets/rewrites those instructions into "native" SQL. Things like LinQ to SQL or Hibernate or Enterprise Framework.

    So - what can you NOT do so far with a combination of SQL server and one or mor than one of the above solutions? LinQ, although not entirely mature, certainly does allow you to embed data calls in a much more procedural-feeling piece of code.

    Putting some further focus on your question will help to. Open-ended as it is - it's a tough question to answer.

    I assume your an sql expert so let me ask you a question, what would it take to entice you to try something like dataphor? If you're thinking in terms of 'features' what specifically are you looking for that you can't find in sql server? If you can go beyond specific feature(s) what 'something' would attract your attention? I'm not trying to splurk you. I'm trying to get some experts amped about a new approach to writing queries and solving problems without funkdafying sql 🙂 Consider this a challenge. Put up what's on your mind. And if you're not looking for anything that sql doesn't offer that gravy noodles 🙂

    best,

    steve

    www.beyondsql.blogspot.com

    Don't confuse the fact that I post here a lot with the fact that this is the only thing I deal with... I have always used a variety of tools around data, and will continue to do so. Most of my career has been spent moving manipul;ating and serving data using whatever means necessary to accomplish the task, so when the solution wasn't available OOB, I just went and made my own at times.

    The question though was how to give SQL Server more dataphor features, and not how to lure folks away from using SQL Server. Fox's question was confusing to me, since Dataphor and the other related products (rel, D4, etc....) were built by folks who thought the traditional RDBMS'es were flawed beyond repair and should be gutted, and should be replaced by something which essentially only deals with data in 6NF, as per some of the dictates of the 3rd Manifesto.

    So - I was simply trying to reconcile his request, since we wants to use the "flawed engine" with the "improved language". Interesting though that the primary argument from the data practiioners to the data academics that keep pushing the 3rd Manifesto is that while their model is nice and fun, it just won't hold up performance or growth-wise against anything production standards. In other words - the theory will never withstand the perf constraints required to function in the "real" world. So - it was interesting to hear someone hope for the "improved" expressiveness using the perf of the stodgy old SQL engine.

    Ok Mr. T-Rex sql'er 🙂 I think you're trying to put it to me by raising what you feel is one big hyporacy. If relationaland thinks sql is such a blivet why is it the backend for dataphor? Do I have it right? (I'll hold off on your idea that its performance must be smeg). 🙂

    best,

    steve

    www.beyondsql.blogspot.com

  • steve dassin (4/1/2009)

    Ok. The new idea is actually an old idea that's never be tried. It's a relational system that most sql folks haven't gotten their head into and/or around. If you were to fork sql, redesign the language syntax, make it an algebra and bolt it into a strongly 'typed' environment where all objects are typed variables you'd be on your way to a relational system. Dataphor is an attempt for users to actually see and taste what these ideas are like in practice. To most sql experts (and most other users for that matter) these are abstract ideas that are marginalized by calling them 'theoretical' and 'academic' as opposed to practical. Dataphor is an attempt to make data management scientific and put this science in your face. 🙂

    back to best,

    steve

    www.beyondsql.blogspot.com

    So, if to cut the marketing c..p, whnat we have?

    Renaming views into "typed variables" is the big idea?

    Is this what you name "algebra" and "science"?

    _____________
    Code for TallyGenerator

  • steve dassin (4/1/2009)

    ...Do you really think I'd be wasting my time if dataphor represented the same old, same old!...

    The thought did cross my mind that you are wasting our time talking about a tool that no one is using now or ever will use.

    Maybe you could point us to some success stories from users of this product so we can better understand the real world benefits.

    Something along the lines of “SAP announces intention to use Dataphor for data access in all future development. CTO says move will save millions in development and maintenance costs.”

    Or “Oracle announces Dataphor will be used for all future releases and SQL to be deprecated.”

    As least something more compelling than “Original Dataphor developers give up and make it open source in hopes that someone will use it.”

  • Sergiy (4/1/2009)


    steve dassin (4/1/2009)

    Ok. The new idea is actually an old idea that's never be tried. It's a relational system that most sql folks haven't gotten their head into and/or around. If you were to fork sql, redesign the language syntax, make it an algebra and bolt it into a strongly 'typed' environment where all objects are typed variables you'd be on your way to a relational system. Dataphor is an attempt for users to actually see and taste what these ideas are like in practice. To most sql experts (and most other users for that matter) these are abstract ideas that are marginalized by calling them 'theoretical' and 'academic' as opposed to practical. Dataphor is an attempt to make data management scientific and put this science in your face.

    🙂

    back to best,

    steve

    www.beyondsql.blogspot.com

    So, if to cut the marketing c..p, whnat we have?

    Renaming views into "typed variables" is the big idea?

    Is this what you name "algebra" and "science"?

    The sql community, by and large, has stuck its head in the sand when it comes to Linq and the entity framework. They still don't get 'it'. That's too bad because Linq (to Sql) is a good introduction to understanding what Linq folks call composables. This is the ability of C#/Vb# to realize a query as a 'type' of 'variable' inside the language. The query is said to be composable and can be referred to in subsequent queries and elsewhere (because it is a variable like a string or number). Unfortunately the Linq type is 'anonymous' because the meaning and substance of the type has no real significance. In a relational system the composable (variable) is a 'relation', a variable whose type has all the significance in the world. This 'relational' composeable (ie table variable) has significant consequences. For example the result of a query in dataphor can be used anywhere. The opposite of this is the sql CTE which can only be used in the immediate dml statement(s) that includes it in its statement. The CTE represents the

    opposite of a variable, a constant if you will. Because a table is represented as a variable the same operations that apply to comparing numbers apply to comparing tables. So two table can be tested for equality, ' ='. This represents the easiest type of relational division. Dynamic sql can be seen as a (poor) attempt to overcome the fact that a table is not composable, not a variable. Because it is a variable in dataphor tables/expressions can be directly passed to operators (stored procedures) without the sql nonsense of xml or the ridiculousness and utter absurdity of table typed parameters. In fact in sql any reference to a table as a 'variable' is all smoke and mirrors 🙂 As a computer science term a 'variable' has no meaning and simply doesn't exist in reference to an sql table/resultset.

    I suggest you check out this introduction to Linq:

    The Essence of LINQ

    By Charlie Calvert and Dinesh Kulkarni

    Mar 30, 2009

    http://www.informit.com/articles/article.aspx?p=1330154

    Especially the discussion on Composable and Discreet:

    http://www.informit.com/articles/article.aspx?p=1330154&seqNum=6

    Then check out what the situation would have been had MS stayed with a relation model:

    http://beyondsql.blogspot.com/2007/09/dataphor-all-tables-are-typed-variables.html

    http://beyondsql.blogspot.com/2007/10/sql-whats-really-with-with.html

    If MS had gone relational most people here would be jumping up and down like Jack Flash -:)

    A final thought. The 'algebra' I'm speaking of is the nature of dataphor query construction. Sql is a calculus (if you could call it that) that can get way to complicated. Dataphor is an algebra, much easier and friendlier to the head 🙂

    best,

    steve

    www.beyondsql.blogspot.com

  • Michael Valentine Jones (4/2/2009)


    steve dassin (4/1/2009)

    ...Do you really think I'd be wasting my time if dataphor represented the same old, same old!...

    The thought did cross my mind that you are wasting our time talking about a tool that no one is using now or ever will use.

    What are you the Site Czar? The Sql Ayatollah? You got something against independent thought? 🙂

    >Maybe you could point us to some success stories from users of this

    >product so we can better understand the real world benefits.

    You read any giant success stories about Linq to sql/entity framework lately? The sql community trashes Linq to sql yet its been very well accepted in the developer community. Do you think the fact that Sap isn't

    using it is known to developers? What's wrong with this picture. To most developers the real world benefit of Linq is that MS has tapped into their dislike of sql and given them an alternative (paradigm and model)! How you like those apples 🙂 I'm trying to give you an alternative too but in the case of dataphor it's right up your relational alley. Here's a new flash, MS is ripping its own sql and you don't even realize it. I'm not 'ripping' sql, I'm trying to build on it. Problem is you don't know where your bread is buttered 🙂 Read some of my blog articles and maybe a bigger and brighter picture will sink in. Hell maybe you'll use it and write your own success story 😀

    best,

    steve

    www.beyondsql.blogspot.com

  • steve dassin (4/3/2009)


    Michael Valentine Jones (4/2/2009)


    steve dassin (4/1/2009)

    ...Do you really think I'd be wasting my time if dataphor represented the same old, same old!...

    The thought did cross my mind that you are wasting our time talking about a tool that no one is using now or ever will use.

    What are you the Site Czar? The Sql Ayatollah? You got something against independent thought? 🙂

    >Maybe you could point us to some success stories from users of this

    >product so we can better understand the real world benefits.

    You read any giant success stories about Linq to sql/entity framework lately? The sql community trashes Linq to sql yet its been very well accepted in the developer community. Do you think the fact that Sap isn't

    using it is known to developers? What's wrong with this picture. To most developers the real world benefit of Linq is that MS has tapped into their dislike of sql and given them an alternative (paradigm and model)! How you like those apples 🙂 I'm trying to give you an alternative too but in the case of dataphor it's right up your relational alley. Here's a new flash, MS is ripping its own sql and you don't even realize it. I'm not 'ripping' sql, I'm trying to build on it. Problem is you don't know where your bread is buttered 🙂 Read some of my blog articles and maybe a bigger and brighter picture will sink in. Hell maybe you'll use it and write your own success story 😀

    best,

    steve

    www.beyondsql.blogspot.com

    So, I guess that’s a big No on the Dataphor success stories?

    As for being the Site Czar or SQL Ayatollah, no I’m not. I think I have been engaging in relevant discussions with you, and asking questions. Let’s just say that you attracted my attention by setting off my BS detector. I’ve been giving you the benefit of the doubt, but I still haven’t seen any benefit to Dataphor. It just looks like another failed product to me.

    If you don’t want to hear what I have to say, well that’s too bad. This is a public forum, and anyone can play. Feel free to prove everything I have said is wrong if you can. Wouldn’t be the first time I was wrong, so I’m still listening.

  • I suggest you check out this introduction to Linq:

    The Essence of LINQ

    By Charlie Calvert and Dinesh Kulkarni

    Mar 30, 2009

    http://www.informit.com/articles/article.aspx?p=1330154

    Especially the discussion on Composable and Discreet:

    http://www.informit.com/articles/article.aspx?p=1330154&seqNum=6

    Then check out what the situation would have been had MS stayed with a relation model

    Microsoft giving object developers Northwind as a file is what took LINQ to SQL to life support because some of the writers of the books in the list below which I call the good, the bad and the ugly do not know basic SQL concepts. So that book is Microsoft correcting mistakes in a brilliant project that failed in implementation because we the object relational developers who knows what is wrong asked for it.

    http://blogs.msdn.com/charlie/archive/2008/02/17/linq-books.aspx

    Kind regards,
    Gift Peddie

  • Michael Valentine Jones (4/3/2009)


    So, I guess that’s a big No on the Dataphor success stories?

    As for being the Site Czar or SQL Ayatollah, no I’m not. I think I have been engaging in relevant discussions with you, and asking questions. Let’s just say that you attracted my attention by setting off my BS detector. I’ve been giving you the benefit of the doubt, but I still haven’t seen any benefit to Dataphor. It just looks like another failed product to me.

    If you don’t want to hear what I have to say, well that’s too bad. This is a public forum, and anyone can play. Feel free to prove everything I have said is wrong if you can. Wouldn’t be the first time I was wrong, so I’m still listening.

    >If you don’t want to hear what I have to say, well that’s too bad.

    Of course I want you to speak your mind. I'm not here to read what I have to say 🙂

    >Let’s just say that you attracted my attention by setting off my BS detector.

    Ok, I can't blame you a bit! But all the blogging I've done, all the explanations and examples can't take the place of your personal interaction with the system. There's no view in sql or in dataphor that's as important as your view. All I'm asking of you is to verify your BS detector 🙂

    best,

    steve

  • steve dassin (4/1/2009)


    relationaland thinks sql is such a blivet why is it the backend for dataphor?

    It's the backend for a lot. Why isn't DataPhor the new backend? 😉 There's no real teeth to what you say until you stop riding the same train everyone else does. :hehe:

    --Jeff Moden


    RBAR is pronounced "ree-bar" and is a "Modenism" for Row-By-Agonizing-Row.
    First step towards the paradigm shift of writing Set Based code:
    ________Stop thinking about what you want to do to a ROW... think, instead, of what you want to do to a COLUMN.

    Change is inevitable... Change for the better is not.


    Helpful Links:
    How to post code problems
    How to Post Performance Problems
    Create a Tally Function (fnTally)

  • steve dassin (4/3/2009)


    The sql community, by and large, has stuck its head in the sand when it comes to Linq and the entity framework. They still don't get 'it'. That's too bad because Linq (to Sql) is a good introduction to understanding what Linq folks call composables. This is the ability of C#/Vb# to realize a query as a 'type' of 'variable' inside the language. The query is said to be composable and can be referred to in subsequent queries and elsewhere (because it is a variable like a string or number). Unfortunately the Linq type is 'anonymous' because the meaning and substance of the type has no real significance. In a relational system the composable (variable) is a 'relation', a variable whose type has all the significance in the world. This 'relational' composeable (ie table variable) has significant consequences. For example the result of a query in dataphor can be used anywhere. The opposite of this is the sql CTE which can only be used in the immediate dml statement(s) that includes it in its statement. The CTE represents the

    opposite of a variable, a constant if you will. Because a table is represented as a variable the same operations that apply to comparing numbers apply to comparing tables. So two table can be tested for equality, ' ='. This represents the easiest type of relational division. Dynamic sql can be seen as a (poor) attempt to overcome the fact that a table is not composable, not a variable. Because it is a variable in dataphor tables/expressions can be directly passed to operators (stored procedures) without the sql nonsense of xml or the ridiculousness and utter absurdity of table typed parameters. In fact in sql any reference to a table as a 'variable' is all smoke and mirrors 🙂 As a computer science term a 'variable' has no meaning and simply doesn't exist in reference to an sql table/resultset.

    I suggest you check out this introduction to Linq:

    The Essence of LINQ

    By Charlie Calvert and Dinesh Kulkarni

    Mar 30, 2009

    http://www.informit.com/articles/article.aspx?p=1330154

    Especially the discussion on Composable and Discreet:

    http://www.informit.com/articles/article.aspx?p=1330154&seqNum=6

    Then check out what the situation would have been had MS stayed with a relation model:

    http://beyondsql.blogspot.com/2007/09/dataphor-all-tables-are-typed-variables.html

    http://beyondsql.blogspot.com/2007/10/sql-whats-really-with-with.html

    If MS had gone relational most people here would be jumping up and down like Jack Flash -:)

    A final thought. The 'algebra' I'm speaking of is the nature of dataphor query construction. Sql is a calculus (if you could call it that) that can get way to complicated. Dataphor is an algebra, much easier and friendlier to the head 🙂

    best,

    steve

    www.beyondsql.blogspot.com

    Don't even know what to say...

    First of all, it's calculus is much easier to the head then algebra.

    Science is not where it's simple, it's in quite opposite direction.

    Making tables a variable type?

    It's just stupid.

    Table is not an object. It's bigger - its a SET OF OBJECTS.

    When you talking about comparing tables - what are the criteria? Comparing by what?

    Let's take an example.

    I've got a catalog. I load a file with new records. What it will compare?

    Every byte to every byte? Honestly, I don't give a s..t.

    I need just to know if there is a record with the same CaalogID and PartNumber, and I don't wanna server to spend resources on comparing every character in descriptions.

    Especially when existing catalog contains 1.5 million records and I load 300k of new ones.

    Total size of the catalog tables is about 3GB.

    What kind of server you need for such task in Dataphore? How long will it take?

    Not to mention the result of that megatask would be absolutely useless.

    As it's already been stated - your Dataphore is limited to dull projects with simple data structure and small quantity of objects. Just like many other "Object Oriented Databases".

    It may add some comfort of programming for those who know only C# or C++, but it's not good enough for real world tasks.

    _____________
    Code for TallyGenerator

  • Just a note to say I'll be addressing some interesting responses from the discontinued thread:

    T-Sql rant

    http://www.sqlservercentral.com/Forums/Topic675554-8-1.aspx

    Some of the responses were thoughtful and interesting, especially from Matt "The Dragon" Miller, Jeff "The Butcher" Moden and Sir "WildThing" Sergiy.

    I'll be backkk! 🙂

    steve,

    www.beyondsql.blogspot.com

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