Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!att!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!cwjcc!hal!ncoast!allbery
From: allbery@ncoast.UUCP (Brandon S. Allbery)
Newsgroups: comp.databases
Subject: Re: Re.: SQL = 4GL
Message-ID: <12322@ncoast.UUCP>
Date: 31 Aug 88 23:33:48 GMT
References: <5829@ihlpf.ATT.COM> <1493@siemens.UUCP>
Reply-To: allbery@ncoast.UUCP (Brandon S. Allbery)
Followup-To: comp.databases
Organization: Cleveland Public Access UN*X, Cleveland, Oh
Lines: 29

As quoted from <1493@siemens.UUCP> by fwb@demon.siemens.com (Frederic W. Brehm):
+---------------
| larry@postgres.uucp (Larry Rowe) writes:
| >SQL is *definitely* not a 4GL.
| 
| mohan@ihlpf.ATT.COM (Mohan Palat) responds:
| >	If 1GL = machine languages, 2GL = assembly languages, 3GL = high level
| >	programming languages, and SQL cannot be classified as a 4GL,
| >	then where exactly do data definition and manipulation languages
| >	like SQL fit in, in this hierarchy?
| 
| I quip:
| Perhaps this isn't a one dimensional problem.
+---------------

Just to expand on that...

SQL doesn't fit into the hierarchy.  This is because it is not *complete*;
it can do a certain limited set of operations, but almost every real-world
application uses SQL in conjunction with other languages, whether 3GLs (C,
Ada, PL/I, Pascal, whatever) or 4GLs (OSL, Informix-4GL, Accell/Language,
etc.).  SQL may be used as a component in a 4GL, but it is not complete
enough to be a 4GL, or a 3GL, or anything else.

++Brandon
-- 
Brandon S. Allbery, uunet!marque!ncoast!allbery			DELPHI: ALLBERY
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