On okt. 14, 13:26, Paul Boddie <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > On 14 Okt, 00:43, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > > > > > It is not convincing to look at an XML file alone. Let me give you an > > example. Glade is a GTK+ application for creating GTK+ GUI. It > > generates an XML file, that can be loaded in every programming > > language that has libglade binding. Similarly, there could be a > > database design tool to create a database, and save SQL/DML > > expressions into an XML config file. Then you create the RDB command > > objects by loading the XML in your favourite language. > > I'd agree that XML makes a good interchange representation which saves > everyone from having to parse various things, but having worked a bit > with relational databases and having had to actively manage their > schemas, I have to say that my primary representation for a schema is > SQL/DDL, and that my primary representation for queries is also SQL. > Now, there's a lot to be said for making that SQL more consumable, and > I've done a little work on converting SQL to XML (as have many others) > in order to make life easier for, say, tool authors, and I'd even go > as far as saying that it should be possible to convert XML back to > SQL, but in doing so there would potentially remain a need for the XML > dialect to be as expressive as SQL, which then means that you have to > replicate SQL in XML. > > > I think programming languages are intended for describing neither relational > > databases nor GUIs. > > The above discussion is somewhat tangential to what you've done, > though, and I certainly didn't mean to say that the use of XML was in > any way "wrong", especially in the way you've been using it. I suppose > that when you state the above about programming languages, you > actually mean languages other than SQL. Even so, I'd much rather use > SQL to describe a database table than one of the many different Python- > based, class-plus-attributes representations so beloved of the various > object-relational mappers. > > I look forward to seeing where you take your project in future, > however. > > Paul
I agree more than you thought. I do not want to replace SQL with XML either. I only use XML to interchange data (SQL/DML) between the database designer (tool) and the application interface in order to create a specific database interface for a certain database. It is the focus of database design using different RDBMS-s and different programming languages. There is an other reason for XML. At this point my XML structure contains the SQL/DML expressions as you use it in sql clients, and some metadata to generate documentation using XSL transformation. That's why I provided that sqlface.xsl in the src directory. Yes I have to relocate DTD and XSL from the python source directory. Relational stuff stays in the relational language SQL. Data processing, and business logic goes into a programming language like python. Otherwise I plan to support other languages with such an SQL interface. Peti -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
