Re: ANNOUNCE gnome-db

[Chris Knight <cknite danville net>]

I totally agree.

Dirk-Jan C. Binnema wrote:

> Hi there,
>
> >I'm announcing gnome-db.
>
> <snip>
>
> >The API looks like:
>
> >* db = gnome_db_login(gchar* connection_string, gchar* user, gchar*
> passwd);
>
> I thinks its a great idea to have standardized database access, so good luck
> with it. However, IMO, you should _NOT_ have a Gnome specific API!!!!
> There's nothing inherently GNOME'ish about database access, so lets keep the
> things separated! Why not write a stuff for _generic_ database access (so
> people can use it from CLI, Motif, KDE, Berlin, whatever), and then write
> Gnome (GTK) specific stuff (like an Access clone).
>
> Its a really bad MS-like strategy to lock your "customers" in. IMO opinion
> all GNOME software should have their GNOME-specifics optional, so nobody is
> forced into anything. E.g. Orbit and the Orbit/OLE stuff (as proposed) will
> we Gnome independent Suppose GIMP
> would only run on GNOME, that would be bad, wouldn't it?
>
> I was a bit sceptical earlier about the MS-ADO (active data something) when
> someone suggested this.
> However, after examining it a bit more closely, ADO does have a stable API
> and it looks like its gonna be _the_ higher-than-odbc level for Windoze
> (note that its designed specifically to allow other things than odbc to be
> under it, to be able to access any kind of data (e.g. text files). So you
> have something like:
>
>              [ado]
>                |
>             [oledb]
>   ______________________
>   |                    |
> [odbc]                 |
>   |                    |
> [database]   [other datastores]
>
> This extensive layering may be quite expensive, so you (we?) could make a
> ADO'ish API (or a subset) directly on top of ODBC, and maybe later add an
> extra layer to allow querying of non-odbc datastores. Like:
>
> [ado]
>   |
> [odbc]
>   |
> [database]
>
> Most higher-level database APIs
> look quite alike, so we might as well use one that's already there, and
> adapt the parts we don't like. This
> will make programming (a little) easier, since it means one less API to get
> used to (at least for people
> doing ADO now...). Note that ADO looks quite like the example you gave of
> your API.
>
> Concluding:
> (1) I really like your project, but I have some objections to Gnome-specific
> inplementation of the
> non UI stuff. So I would suggest to remove gnome_ prefixes and replacing
> Gnome/GTK specific dataypes (e.g gint).
> (2) Why not use an existing API, and if necessary, adapt to our needs. For
> example, you could use ADO.
>
> Good luck,
> Dirk-Jan C. Binnema.
>
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