Ruben; I have to mention at this point that the British Stock Exchange is actually being run on MUMPS. Earlier someone said that not all banks run MUMPS. This is a correct statement, but they can also spend a lot more money for less service than if they were using MUMPS technology. Back in 1977, when I worked for Shared Medical Systems out of King of Prussia, PA, we had an average of 15 minutes from report of a database or application problem to its successful resolution on the M systems at remote sites. On our Cobol systems, 3 day turnaround was the norm. Obviously the traditional support has gotten better, but it would be interesting to see what the up-times are like as well as the mean times to repair. A database which is not available does not help care for patients.
As for the purpose of a database is not just to storage, preserve, and validate data. A database also needs to be able to preserve the relationships of data to other data, and to explolit those relationships to gain insight into the meaning of that data. Often those insights are not originally built into the design of the data structures. The database needs to allows for the ad hoc representation to extract that meaning. Best wishes; Chris ----- Original Message ----- From: "Ruben Safir" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <hardhats-members@lists.sourceforge.net> Sent: Sunday, June 12, 2005 4:26 PM Subject: Re: [Hardhats-members] == VistaWeb Missing Apps == > On Sun, Jun 12, 2005 at 07:15:38PM -0400, GARY MONGER wrote: > > Your friends on Wall Street employ quite a few programmers, which they keep > > very busy, some even with M. SQL does not mean you get your data any easier > > or faster, > > That is not the purpsoe of a database. A database needs to store, preserve and > validate data. > > > or that you have less need of professional programmers. > > > > If you are using a conventional RDBMS, realistically what is your > > alternative to SQL? > > :) > > Every database has a built in API which is faster. It's just not universal and > usually needs compulation. > > SQL is just better because it is desinged on sould database theory and honed > by 3 decades of real world expereince. > > > I guess there are some object tools now, but > > historically that toolbox only holds hammers. > > Definetely not. In fact, when I programmered Oracle apps I used no SQL. > > Ruben > __________________________ > Brooklyn Linux Solutions > > So many immigrant groups have swept through our town > that Brooklyn, like Atlantis, reaches mythological > proportions in the mind of the world - RI Safir 1998 > > DRM is THEFT - We are the STAKEHOLDERS - RI Safir 2002 > http://fairuse.nylxs.com > > "Yeah - I write Free Software...so SUE ME" > > http://www.mrbrklyn.com - Consulting > http://www.inns.net <-- Happy Clients > http://www.nylxs.com - Leadership Development in Free Software > http://www2.mrbrklyn.com/resources - Unpublished Archive or stories and articles from around the net > http://www2.mrbrklyn.com/downtown.html - See the New Downtown Brooklyn.... > ------------------------------------------------------- This SF.Net email is sponsored by: NEC IT Guy Games. How far can you shotput a projector? How fast can you ride your desk chair down the office luge track? If you want to score the big prize, get to know the little guy. Play to win an NEC 61" plasma display: http://www.necitguy.com/?r=20 _______________________________________________ Hardhats-members mailing list Hardhats-members@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/hardhats-members
