One could argue that adding TINYINT support makes it harder to migrate
applications from Derby *to* Oracle and DB2. But it seems to me this is
easily mitigated by clearly documenting that this type is not supported
by databases X,Y,Z and thus should be avoided if your plan is to migrate
to that database in the future.
David
Lance J. Andersen wrote:
I am for adding this datatype back. While it may not be part of the SQL
Standard, it is a common datatype supported by multiple vendors. Having
this datatype supported helps with the migration of applications and at
the end of the day making it easier for applications to migrate is more
important than basing a decision soley on whether the datatype is
supported by the SQL standards.
+1 (unofficial vote) for this addition
Rick Hillegas (JIRA) wrote:
Re-enable the TINYINT datatype
------------------------------
Key: DERBY-695
URL: http://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/DERBY-695
Project: Derby
Type: New Feature
Reporter: Rick Hillegas
I would like to collect here the arguments for and against re-enabling
the TINYINT datatype. Once this discussion calms down, we can schedule
a vote on the issue.
Background: Cloudscape used to support the TINYINT datatype, which was
an 8 bit int. This datatype was hidden from customers as part of an
effort to remove all datatypes not supported by DB2. Re-enabling the
datatype would not require a lot of effort. Some arguments for and
against re-enabling this datatype can be found on the November 2005
email thread titled "New features for next release .... (Was: Grant
and Revoke ... DERBY-464...)".
Here are the arguments in favor so far:
+ This datatype is defined by one of our key standards, JDBC. It is in
JDBC 2, 3, and 4, all of the JDBC revs supported by Derby 10.2.
+ This datatype is supported by some important databases, including
MySQL, Microsoft SQL Server, and Sybase.
Here are the arguments against so far:
- This datatype is not defined by our other key standard, ANSI SQL.
Here our two main standards diverge.
- This datatype is not supported by some important databases,
including Oracle, DB2, and (some) Informix databases.
Against this proposal, it was also argued that there was some sort of
friction with ODBC. I do not understand this argument: SQL_TINYINT is
an ODBC datatype. See
http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/odbc/htm/odbcsql_data_types.asp.
A friction with .NET was also suggested but I don't understand this
either. "byte" and "Sbyte" are the .NET 8-bit integer types. See
http://www.codersource.net/csharp_tutorial_data_types.html.
A friction with Perl was also suggested but I don't understand this
either.
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