Re: MySQL versus Postgres

On Aug 6, 2010, at 6:13 AM, Torsten Zühlsdorff wrote:

> John Gage schrieb:
>
>> On reflection, I think what is needed is a handbook that features
>> cut and paste code to do the things with Postgres that people do
>> today with MySQL.
>
> Everyone of my trainees want such thing - for databases, for other
> programming-languages etc. It's the worst thing you can give them.
> The< will copy, they will paste and they will understand nothing.
> Learning is the way to understanding, not copying.

I couldn't disagree more. Presenting working code (at least snippets)
should continue to be a fundamental part of any documentation project.

As a first-time db programmer and 'casual' user of PostgreSQL, I read
Bruce Momjian's book to get started. I rely on the example code
presented in the current documentation to learn best practices,
compare against it to troubleshoot my code when it breaks, and provide
inspiration for elegant solutions to challenges I encounter.

I would further suggest that a QuickStart guide would be an ideal
addition to the current documentation efforts. Scanning a basic soup-
to-nuts solution can often answer fundamental questions more
efficiently than full-blown documentation can, especially when the
user is not already familiar with specific terminology to search for
in the index.

Regards,
Scott

> Greetings,
> Torsten
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