[GRASS5] Multiple attribute support in GRASS5.1:someconsiderations (long)

[Frank Warmerdam]

Radim Blazek wrote:
> SQLite seems to be a good solution. The only problem I see is that there is no
> GUI front-end which was one of my criteria. Dbf files may be edited in StarOffice
> and MSAccess (including forms). I thing that we don't have human resources for developing
> database front-end within grass and we don't want to reinvent wheel. So if such front-end
> is available is important.

Radim,

It seems to me that if we use easily substitutable SQL based RDBMS systems
then folks that need forms support and a GUI front end can choose an 
RDBMS that has them.  If we use DBF and depend on external gui front ends it 
still won't be possible to distribute GRASS database forms applications since
different users might choose different target RDBMSes, right?  

Is the GUI front end and forms requirement just so that users can see their
data interactively, or so that substantial forms based applications can be
built?  

Someone mentioned the issue of having different programs for different
databases.  I completely agree that if we integrate SQL support smoothly
into GRASS that the applications should be insulated from the actual database
backend by some sort of plugable library.  This might be based on an existing
standard like ODBC or just a custom simplied database API.  I was impressed
with the relative simplicity of the abstracted database interface in Python.

BTW, does Postgres have a nice gui front end?  I have always done my work from
psql, but I would dearly love to try something a little more visual. :-)

> BTW: SQLLite files are not portable (The key size thus depends on the size of
> an integer on the host computer.) but that doesn't matter.

This is annoying.  In the short term I guess it would be necessary to do a
database dump and reload to transport to different system types.  I would 
ideally like to see some sort of automatic translation be done at lower 
performance at some point. 

Best regards,

---------------------------------------+--------------------------------------
I set the clouds in motion - turn up   | Frank Warmerdam, warmerdam at pobox.com
light and sound - activate the windows | http://pobox.com/~warmerdam
and watch the world go round - Rush    | Geospatial Programmer for Rent

---------------------------------------- 
If you want to unsubscribe from GRASS Development Team mailing list write to:
minordomo at geog.uni-hannover.de with
subject 'unsubscribe grass5'