Re: Design shift of view

["James W. Kilgore" <qappdsn@xxxxxxx>]

boothm@ibm.net wrote:

> You mean... change the length of the punch card while some of the card
> trays are out of the filing cabinets?  Now there is a scary thought...
>

You're right, it is scary, so was fire! ;-)

Actually, I'm not talking about changing the length of a card, I'm talking about
designing a program that could accept any size card.

With the introduction of variable length fields we have now (finally) acheived
variable length cards.  But even at that we have a fixed number of variables.
How do we acheive a variable number of variables?

Even allowing for null values for ommited entries we have a "fixed" number of
pigeon holes.  This is where we (IS staff) spend time and talent to implement
instead of solve. Also, the enterprise faces the possibility of information flow
shut down during implementation. (regen a data base)

Have you ever noticed that in the program feedback area is a value for number of
parameters?  Why is that there?  To remind you that you have x number of
parameters, or is it because there can be a variable number?  Well, if we can
pass a variable number of parameters to a program, why couldn't a RDMS pass a
variable number of variables?  If we can have a variable number if variables, we
eliminate the "fixed" unit record (card) mentality of disk storage.  And if the
RDMS can't handle it, how do we "design" it?

Scary! ;-)

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