Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!uflorida!haven!vrdxhq!daitc!daitc.daitc.mil
From: jkrueger@daitc.daitc.mil (Jonathan Krueger)
Newsgroups: comp.databases
Subject: Re: Ingres is making me mad!!
Message-ID: <355@daitc.daitc.mil>
Date: 26 Feb 89 08:05:17 GMT
References: <1979@tank.uchicago.edu>
Sender: jkrueger@daitc.daitc.mil
Reply-To: jkrueger@daitc.daitc.mil (Jonathan Krueger)
Organization: Defense Applied Information Technology Center
Lines: 25
In-reply-to: dwayne@rover.bsd.uchicago.edu

In article <1979@tank.uchicago.edu>, dwayne@rover writes:
>The problem is that there appears to be a ** 126 ** column limit, count
>it, not 127 on retrieves and modifies in QBF.

That's interesting.  QBF retrieves the tuple id (tid) too.  Sounds
like that's the missing column.  "Set printqry" tells this kind of stuff.

>Certainly a questionnaire type study is not the best use for a relational
>database.  But for creating a form with which they can logically query
>the data with out much instruction, it is a nice, quick solution.

I disagree.  I think the relational model well suited.  And I've seen
some uses which validate this notion.

Ease of ad hoc queries wasn't high on users' lists though.  They
needed secure and reliable operation, ease of data entry, and
well-defined external interfaces to programs for random assignment and
packages for statistical analysis.  After that came programmer
productivity, software re-use issues.  After that, ad hoc queries.
However, they shared the general goal of ease of use.  They found the
relational model a good framework around which to build user-friendly
front ends.

-- Jon
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