[Qgis-developer] DBManager plugin for QuantumGIS (GSoC 2001)

[Nathan Woodrow]

Hi All,

This is the vision I have for QGIS when it comes to layer handling:  One
unified tree that can handle both files (vector and raster) and database
connections (to any database).  It should be built into QGIS and live in the
dock just like the layers widget.  IMO the QBrowser would end up like this,
just the tree part not the metadata stuff (or have it on demand), and having
the DBManager part of the QBrowser would achieve my unified tree vision.

At the moment how there are 10 different ways to open layers and databases
is not good for usability, and the QBrowser is a good step towards fixing
this issue.  If the DBManager was part of QBrowser then there would only be
one place to go and open any kind of the layer and would remove a lot of
confusion and code.  I have never seen any other GIS app get this right but
I think QBrowser+DBManger integrated into QGIS as a single tree would be a
great win.

Just my thoughts.

- Nathan Woodrow

On Tue, May 24, 2011 at 5:07 PM, Giuseppe Sucameli <brush.tyler at gmail.com>wrote:

> Hi Radim,
>
> On Tue, May 24, 2011 at 7:46 AM, Radim Blazek <radim.blazek at gmail.com>wrote:
>
>> First of all, IMO, the DBManager has to be implemented in QGIS core,
>> not as a plugin for two main reasons:
>
> 1) it is core functionality
>>
> I not agree, it's a GUI functionality. We can implement all the core stuff
> in the
> qgis core creating API for reuse of code (I think about connections, as it
> was done
> in WMS provider) and then accessing that from the plugin, but I don't like
> the idea
> to have DBManager in C++.
>
>
>> 2) connection factories MUST go to providers, otherwise you start to
>> create a set of plugins for each DB, parallel to providers.
>>
> I agree with you about this point, as you can see I added yesterday the
> QgsDataItem section to the wiki.
>
>  >From UI point of view, I would prefer to have everything in one place,
>> that means in QBrowser. We can rename QBrowser to QManager and
>> suddenly it sounds more logical.
>
> QBrowser is a standalone application, a C++ application, I think the
> manager should
> be easily maintainable and IMHO python code is the best solution.
>
>  Having everything in one tree will
>> allow in future to easily drag-and-drop for example Shapefile to
>> PostGIS and so on.
>
> That is not a problem, that feature could be implemented in providers, an
> import
> method which take a QgsMapLayer (this was in my gsoc proposal yet), but
> have
> everything in core without any real and strong reason could make the core
> code
> hard to maintain.
>
> We have to add support for other providers to
>> QBrowser anyway. It does not make sense to have another similar UI
>> just for databases, implemented in a different way. Currently QBrowser
>> is a stand alone application but it will be integrated also to QGIS
>> main application.
>>
> QBrowser it's implemented as a C++ standalone application to browse files
> and
> show information about layers, but those are the same infos you can get
> using QGis.
>
> The manager would make easy the use of databases in QGis, but not for QGis
> use
> only. Ok, we can show preview, load a layer in canvas, but also run
> queries,
> create/edit/drop tables and views, ... pretty different from the QBrowser
> aim!
>
> I think all the qgis-devs should say their opinion about this question
> raised by Radim.
>
> I attended the GSoC 2009 for a different FOSS project and after I started
> to work
> on my _accepted_ project all devs said me that they didn't like my project,
> so my
> code was set aside and left on a branch and my GSoC was set as failed even
> if I had
> ended coding = no gsoc shirt :'( and no money for the second coding period
> :(
>
> I don't want to work again on something that devs don't like,
> so please devs, I need your opinion. Thanks.
>
> Regards.
>
> QgsDataItem probably is not the best place where db connections should
>> be implemented, but it is good place where they can be used to
>> represent databases in QgsBrowserModel and thus in QBrowser. I can
>> imagine a QgsDatabase inherited by QgsPostGis, QgsSqlite etc. with all
>> the methods you list on [2]. Then a single QgsDatabaseItem (which
>> would inherit from QgsDataItem) could represent any DB provider,
>> taking as parameter a QgsDatabase child for specific provider.
>>
>>
>> Radim
>>
>>
>> On Mon, May 23, 2011 at 5:21 PM, Giuseppe Sucameli
>> <brush.tyler at gmail.com> wrote:
>> > Hi all,
>> > I'm starting to work on DBManager plugin for QuantumGIS.
>> >
>> > I've just created the repository on GitHub [1] and here's [2] a page on
>> the
>> > QGis wiki
>> > containing ideas I wrote in the past few days. I will add weekly reports
>> to
>> > that wiki page.
>> >
>> > Any comments and reviews are very welcome.
>> > Regards.
>> >
>> > [1] http://github.com/brushtyler/db_manager
>> > [2] http://www.qgis.org/wiki/DB_Manager_plugin_GSoC_2011
>> >
>> > --
>> > Giuseppe Sucameli
>> >
>> > _______________________________________________
>> > Qgis-developer mailing list
>> > Qgis-developer at lists.osgeo.org
>> > http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/qgis-developer
>> >
>> >
>>
>
>
>
> --
> Giuseppe Sucameli
>
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