This is complicated and with the current DAL I am not sure myself what it would break. I am rewriting the DAL to be more modular and allow mapping between virtual names and actual names. This will be possible then.
Massimo On Jun 26, 9:07 am, brado <br...@movedbylight.com> wrote: > Legacy databases without Id fields: a lightweight proposal. > > I plan to pluck information from a live Drupal site into a Web2Py > site, and I love Web2Py's compact database layer. > > Drupal designs it's tables with an autoincrementing integer primary > key, which agrees with gluon.sql, but it names them differently, like > 'nid' (node id), or 'uid' (user id), which gluon.sql won't accept. > > Let's NOT get into another synthetic key vs. natural key debate. It's > an old argument with bright people on both sides who won't be > convinced (well, perhaps after we decide "What's the best editor?"). > Personally, I applaud web2py's design decision to always require a > synthetic key (the implicit 'id' field). It keeps the DAL relativley > small and comprehensible. If I need natural keys, I'll use SQLAlchemy, > and the web2py site graciously show how to do this, and that may well > be what I end up doing. > > I am considering patching sql.py for my own use when I want to access > existing tables that follow web2py's design, but not it's naming > convention. That is, they have 'id', but they name it something else. > > Here are the proposed changes, all in gluon.sql: > > 1. Replace the string literal 'id' with an attribute of SQLTable like > self.id_field_name. (Careful not to replace locations where 'id' is a > field type rather than a field name. > > 2. Add a named arg to the table constructor: SqlTable(..., > id_field_name='id') which would change the value of that attribute. > > 3. Change SQLTable.__getattr__ to read: > > def __getattr__(self, key): > if key=='id': > return dict.__getitem__(self, self.id_field_name) > return dict.__getitem__(self,key) > > Seems like a good idea, but my head isn't in the code to fully know > what it would break. Does anybody see glaring red flags in this? --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "web2py Web Framework" group. To post to this group, send email to web2py@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to web2py+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/web2py?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
