Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!swrinde!ringer!geckhard
From: geckhard@ringer.cs.utsa.edu (Gary Eckhardt)
Newsgroups: comp.databases
Subject: Re: PICK dbms/os on UNIX
Message-ID: <1991Jun11.224403.9172@ringer.cs.utsa.edu>
Date: 11 Jun 91 22:44:03 GMT
References: <10595@idunno.Princeton.EDU> <1991Jun10.223018.26414@ringer.cs.utsa.edu> <10628@idunno.Princeton.EDU>
Organization: University of Texas at San Antonio, San Antonio, Texas
Lines: 32

In article <10628@idunno.Princeton.EDU> gpmenos@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (G. Philippe Menos) writes:
>In article <1991Jun10.223018.26414@ringer.cs.utsa.edu> geckhard@ringer.cs.utsa.edu (Gary Eckhardt) writes:
>>PICK was a good idea at the time it was developed, leading the way for
>>other database systems like itself, but it has grown sorta obsolete.
>>
>
>Thanks for your views.  I wonder if you could elaborate on the term
>"obsolete."  Could you give me some practical implications.  Later you

An Example:  In PICK, you use the dictionary approach to data, specifying
what that data looks like via formats, etc.  The only limitation was that
a dictionary could not go beyond the boundaries of the data file, i.e. I
could not include a dictionary item that was actually a data element from
another data file.  To me, that was limiting, and obsolete, because with
SQL you can develop Views that will let you do just that.

>>Working with a 9-Track tape drive on the Honeywell system, it took more than
>>72 hours to complete a file restore.  Working with a 9-Track tape and the
>>PC version of PICK, it took closer to 5 days.  I have had no experience with
>
>This does sound excessive, to say the least.  But could you tell me the
>approximate size of the database in question, so I have a better idea of
>of the scale of this inefficiency.

The database was approximately 80 Megabytes or so.  We were close to
filling up a 100 meg disk.  This inefficiency has been demonstrated
to be the same across two different platforms that I've seen it run
on. 

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Gary B. Eckhardt     Univ. Of Texas at San Antonio     geckhard@ringer.utsa.edu
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