Re: NoSQL -vs- SQL

On Mon, 11 Oct 2010, Carlos Mennens wrote:

> Just wondering how you guys feel about NoSQL and I just wanted to share
> the following article...
>
> http://www.linuxjournal.com/article/10770
>
> Looking to read your feedback and / or opinions.

Carlos,

I stopped reading LJ several years ago, but that's a very interesting
article ... for the first couple of pages. IMNSHO, there is no conflict
between SQL/RDBMS and the various flavors of NoSQL. It's a case of horses
for courses or vehicles for uses.

You would probably not want to use a semi-tractor to run errands around
town, yet it's ideal for hauling three large semi-trailers across the
country on the Interstate Highway System. Similarly, you would not use a
spreadsheet to store and retrieve massive amounts of data (well, most of us
wouldn't) when a database is called for. And, despite what we see all too
frequently when biological data (of the bugs and bunnies variety) are
analyzed is the use of parametric statistics when the data are not
parametrically distributed, but most folks do not know non-parametric
equivalents and their Excel(R) spreadsheets don't have those formulae built
in.

It appears from the article that NoSQL in its various incarnations is well
suited for some Web-based applications. For those applications it's better
by measures considered important by the application owners than the SQL
rdbms that have been used. It's not a case of one-size-solution-fits-all,
but of developing a better tool for a specific application or class of
applications.

And that's my $2.00 worth.

Rich