Comment by tabtab | Hacker News Reader

Comment by tabtab | Hacker News Reader

Many of those complaints seem theoretical. I like to focus on practical concerns. The biggest problem I see is that the SQL language has grown too complex. It's related to the "Lack of Orthogonality" problem mentioned in the article, but I see different solutions. SQL is not based on combinations of simpler concepts, but hard-coded keywords. But how to orthogonize (factor) it gets into philosophical differences. My favorite alternative is an experimental language called SMEQL (Structured Meta-Enabled Query Language):

https://wiki.c2.com/?TqlRoadmap

It's more API-like to reduce the need for specialized keywords. And you can "calculate" column lists via queries instead of have to list columns. For example, if a table has 60 columns and you want to SELECT all 60 minus two columns, you can't without listing all 58. With SMEQL you can use a query to return a list (table) of those 58 and feed it to the equivalent of a SELECT clause.

Things like CREATE TABLE are fed a table if you desire so you can "compute" your schema. You can generate entire schemas from data dictionaries. Anything that can be done with a table is. You can create in-line (virtual) tables if you want it command-driven, but it's still "using tables to do everything". You can use textual code to create such virtual tables or a table editor as it fits the situation. SMEQL is as close to "everything is a table" as I've seen. Even your FROM list can be table-ized. I used to do similar with dBASE/xBASE, and it was really nice, especially for ad-hoc work such as one-off research requests.

And as somebody mentioned here, null handling needs a serious revisit in SQL. I could rant all day about SQL null handling, especially for strings.

"Many of those complaints seem theoretical. I like to focus on practical concerns."

The only reason ever why people engage into theory, is precisely because of a deeply rooted desire to address "practical concerns". Hawking literally stated that his aim was to understand everything about the entire universe.

People who "like to focus on practical concerns" see an apple fall and (after they've seen it happen often enough and never ever otherwise) ultimately conclude that "apples fall and that's just how it is". Newton saw an apple fall and ultimately unveiled the concept of gravity. In doing so, Newton also unveiled the (admittedly extremely exceptional) circumstances in which it might be possible for us to see an apple "fall upward into the skies" after all.

Many "overly educated" (for lack of nice way to say it) just seem to often waste time on idealistic issues. It would take a while to give a decent example, but they just seem to not understand the business world and capitalism. The Newton example is not applicable because it's usually not about discovery, but weighing tradeoffs. I don't mind their personal R&D, just don't make the customer pay for or wait too long for the R&D. After work, they can invent all they want.

I agree!!! this is my pet peeve as well, and I sometimes fantasize about ripping into PostgreSQL and adding column-minus.

One wrinkle: computed columns would interfere with query optimization. That said (and here I speak heresy) there are times when syntactic convenience trumps performance.

The syntax could be "* (minus, columns, here)".

Meta ability (dynamism) will generally have an average performance penalty. If you want speed, you hard-code more up front. Meta-ability generally is best for ad-hoc and short-term uses.

One performance trick is for the query optimizer assume the calculation will be the same as the last time the same query or sub-query was issued, and simply dump the results and start over if that assumption is false. If it keeps having to dump, then it assumes you are editing a lot and stops guessing for a day or so. (You could issue an optimizer command to resume guessing if need be.)

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