Re: [HACKERS] Enhancing PGSQL to be compatible with Informix SQL

At 03:09 PM 1/6/00 +0000, Rod Chamberlin wrote:
I wrote:
>> Rather than go blow-by-blow,

(I meant blow-by-blow through Rod's list)...

>Actually what I'm proposing is more to support mutiple database syntaxes
>wherever possible. The INFORMIX style of outer join (and for that matter
>the oracle style), are not gramatically exclusive. There is no reason why
>you should not allow *all* sane outer join syntaxes, apart from the added
>complexity in the parser.

Well, there are reasons, actually. Documentation as well as the parser
becomes more complex, and ... well ... it's messy and ugly.

>
>The same is true largely for the other changes I suggested. They are for
>portability with other systems to attempt to minimise the amount of work
>necessary to migrate a given application.

In many cases you could write a pre-processor to bulk-translate stuff
if you wanted. Indeed, friends and I porting the Ars Digita Community
system have done some of that ourselves (moving it from Oracle).

>Why is this interesting for Informix? Two reasons I can list
>offhand:

>1/ Informix is currently deserting it's customer base of small
>business users, instead trying to concetrate on larger organisations.
>There are therefore vasts numbers of users crying out for something to
>fill that gap. This I will admit provides a commercial basis for any such
>attempt, since we have already got some of the other tools which
>informix users will be interested in.

So write a portability tool to help them move their stuff.

Just MHO, of course.

- Don Baccus, Portland OR <dhogaza(at)pacifier(dot)com>
Nature photos, on-line guides, Pacific Northwest
Rare Bird Alert Service and other goodies at
http://donb.photo.net.