The "self-contained database" feature is
targeted at unexperienced users,
OK, now here is where I have a concern, self-contained databases have a
whole list, imo, of benefits for developers targeting small
businesses and in-house developers at small businesses (SB). Most of
these have to do with the effort and support needed to get the customer
site up and running. How to setup production and testing envrionments
for the user site. How to deliver updates of the database
application,etc. I know that the database engines in the dedicated
servers will always stomp the engines in the embedded realm, but so
what. A database engine is only one part of an application, and
embedded engines are good enough for a lot of purposes.
If I as a developer do my job correctly then from the users stand point
it dosen't matter if they are 'unexperienced or not', they will never
actually be digging around at the database object level. They will be
thinking in the business object level.
Now if they, users, are going to start creating databases applications
for themselves. Then they will by definition, and by temperment quickly
become NOT unexperienced users.
I hate to be a heretic but there is a reason MS Access has done so well
in the market place and it is not simply because of marketing or big
bully tactics. It is because a light, self-contained database manager
with integrated forms management, a decent report writer and passable
coding environment and support for a dozen or so users just fits in a
whole lot of user situations.
Over the years I have had the pleasure, if that is the right word (and
it wasn't always at the time), of porting MS Access or Jet based
applications to larger more 'robust' RDBM engines and traditional, "big
boy", development environments 6 times. In all these cases this was not
a sign of failure on the part of the MS Access developers, it was a
sign of success. In each case the business usefullness of the
application had proven itself, over time, to the point that the number
of users had grown beyond what the Jet engine could reasonably be
expectied to handle.
Anyway, I know that the road of development for 2.0 is already taken,
but 2.01 is still just a twinkle in the eye, right.
So,as a now self employeed developer, no longer with the budgets of the
corporate commercial software world at my disposal and tageting the SB
environment, under 50 users, I am hoping OOo can give me a tool just
close to as good as MS Access has been. And do so in the embedded
database format. I know how to use the REAL database mangers, I did for
that for the other 19 years of my commercial software career.
In other, and final, words. I like a whole lot of what I see so far,
including the HSQL engine and hope that OOoBase will use all of its
features to the fullest. Don;t dumb it down, you won't help the users
really, but you will make life harder for the developers. Oh and
Please, Please events at the database file level and a simple auto-run
form :-)
Andrew Jensen
Frank Schnheit - Sun Microsystems Germany wrote:
Hi Andrew,
A few questions regarding User accounts and the embedded HSQL database
engine?
I suppose I can boil it all down to - Will they be supported or not?
Users - maybe. At the moment, they aren't - as you rightly stated -, but
they might make sense.
Schemas - probably not. The "self-contained database" feature is
targeted at unexperienced users, and those would most probably be
confused when we throw terms like "schemas" at them (well, my dad
definately would). So, if we ever go to support schemas for the embedded
HSQLDB database, then we would need to be very careful to not alienate
large parts of our target user base.
Ciao
Frank
