Re: Relational Databases

Dave-

         What is generally meant by database transparency, or at least as I 
see it, is that your code does not rely on any particular database. There 
are many types of databases out there, with their strengths and weaknesses, 
but not all of those strengths and weakness rely on the way that 
interacting with the database them is coded.
         If you distill it all down, there is a very large common set of 
functionality in databases. This common set of functionality is exposed by 
ODBC and similar APIs. ODBC stands for open database connectivity, and that 
is the idea. Its called abstraction in other circles.
         Basically for MANY purposes all you want is a record of a database 
given to you by a SQL statement. Do you really care how the database gets 
it to you? Well the quick answer is no. The long answer is that certain 
database are better with certain types of data, so you might. With ODBC you 
can start with  Access and use the common functionality in Access for say 
10 concurrent users doing simple selects (like select ID, name from users) 
at say 5,0000 transactions a day. These numbers are not based in any hard 
data on access really they are just for example. You could take the same 
code and transfer the database structure to Oracle and do 2,000 concurrent 
users doing 4 million transactions. The ONLY thing that has to be changes 
is that the database structure has to be recreated and a few simple setting 
in ODBC. THAT is database transparency.
         It starts to fall apart when you start to get into the really neat 
stuff that different databases have to offer, but it sure carries for the 
bulk of things you will want to do. With the risk of alluding to 
information that I don't have URLs for... There are some really good books 
and articles on how ODBC came about and the impetus for it. It can give you 
a good insight into general coding practices and databases if you read 
them. Anyway, that's my 2c.

Have A Good One-
Stephen Johnston



At 04:37 PM 4/7/2000 , you wrote:
>I get the feeling that I don't understand some of the terminology being 
>used here, esp db transparency,

>At 03:21 PM 4/7/00 +0000, you wrote:
> ><stephen>I just want people to realize that CF is not the answer 
> for >database transparency, it is really good coding and knowledge of 
> the >cross DB capabilities exposed by ODBC that allow for this</stephen>
> >
> >I have been looking into the possibility of working with HTML 
> generated >from databases for some time and following this discussion has 
> been a >great help to me- thankyou everyone.
> >
> >I like the idea of database transparency aluded to in the above posting.
> >
> >-Matt

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