Re: SQL generator - Mailing list pgsql-sql

From Andrew Sullivan
Subject Re: SQL generator
Date
Msg-id 20060726153817.GC23123@phlogiston.dyndns.org
Whole thread Raw
In response to Re: SQL generator  ("Aaron Bono" <postgresql@aranya.com>)
List pgsql-sql
On Wed, Jul 26, 2006 at 10:21:01AM -0500, Aaron Bono wrote:
> Bottom line though, just how difficult is SQL to read and write anyway?  It
> is a hell of a lot easier to read and write than any other computer language
> I have seen.

It's not SQL.  It's the notion of relations.  If the language were
QUEL or ENGLISH (a PICK variant) or whatever you have, but relations
underneath, the same problem would be happening.

Remember, even people who ought to understand this stuff, like
developers who program against databases for a living, frequently get
it wrong.  I'm not surprised that casual users can accidentally do a
5-way Cartesian product.  But it would make no difference if the
commands were specified in natural language, because the conceptual
confusion is the problem.

A

-- 
Andrew Sullivan  | ajs@crankycanuck.ca
A certain description of men are for getting out of debt, yet are
against all taxes for raising money to pay it off.    --Alexander Hamilton


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