In message <mailman.2418.1257062992.2807.python-l...@python.org>, Carsten Haese wrote:
> Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote: > >> In message <mailman.2397.1257034364.2807.python-l...@python.org>, >> Carsten Haese wrote: > >>> On what grounds are you asserting that it's not necessary to mix the >>> two? Please elaborate your point. >> >> On the grounds that Python has more general and powerful string >> parameter- substitution mechanisms than anything built into any database >> API. > > That statement is fundamentally flawed. You are assuming that the > preferred way of getting a value into a query is by substituting a > literal into the query string. That is, in general, not true, because > that would be horribly inefficient. Says someone who hasn't realized where the real inefficiencies are. Remember what Tony Hoare told us: "premature optimization is the root of all evil". These are databases we're talking about. Real-world databases are large, and reside on disk, which is several orders of magnitude slower than RAM. And RAM is where string parameter substitutions take place. So a few hundred extra RAM accesses isn't going to make any significant difference to the speed of database queries. > Finally, you're assuming that every value that can be supplied to a > query actually HAS a literal form. That is not true. For example, in > Informix databases, there are no literals for BYTE-type values. Probably why I don't use Informix. What use is a binary data type if you can't insert and retrieve binary data values? -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
