(Sorry for the duplicate, Jamie, forgot to forward to the list!) --- Jamie <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > ... > 2) Should i use text files for my data or dive > straight into something > like MySQL? I'll propably need the SQL stuff later > on, but is there > any general rule as regards to size/ number of > lines/records? > ...
I've just gone through a similar decision process. It depends entirely on your situation. Some questions you need to consider are: 1) What tools does my platform support? 2) How much data do I have now, and how fast will it grow? 3) How many users do I envision, both concurrent (for record locking, etc.) and total (when security gets more important)? I would definately recommend some kind of SQL database solution for most commercial, and certainly enterprise-wide, applications. I've heard good things about mySQL, but not used it. At the high end, Oracle is one of the most solid there is. I can't quote any exact quantitative recommendations, but I personally wouldn't consider text files for anything bigger than a dozen files of maybe a few hundred records in each. For one thing, in any system of any size, ease and efficiency of record selection and sorting becomes very important, and SQL makes these things very easy. There are SQL drivers for text files, but I would still be concerned with how efficient they could be for large amounts of data. At some point, you've got to have indexes. On the other extreme, there are cases where a SQL database may be overkill. One of my personal projects is a very basic content management system for non-profits and small businesses, tailored to outfits with modest sites virtual-hosted by third-party ISPs and with up to 1/2 dozen content managers, maybe volunteers. I needed to find a storage mechanism that would be easily supported by most ISPs. Some IPSs support mySQL, but not all, and I wanted to be as compatible as possible. (I selected Perl as a language due to its almost universal support by ISPs.) I seriously considered XML storage, but decided that my own learning curve in using it would be too steep for the timetable I wanted to meet, and Perl-based XML tools seem to be in limited supply. So I settled on text CSV files. For my needs, this seemed to make sense. The AnyData::CSV (see CPAN) module supports record selection from CSV's, and I implemented a multi-level sort just using Perl's sort function. (I think it also has a DBI interface option, which I have not investigated.) So those are some considerations for you. In the end, it depends on your situation and it's a judgement call. - John __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Games - play chess, backgammon, pool and more http://games.yahoo.com/ -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
