number of columns in a table field

[Trevor DeVore]

On Jun 1, 2006, at 8:14 PM, Josh Mellicker wrote:
>
> So, to summarize all this rambling, it's clear a Rev library could  
> be written that made 90% of the common things people need to do  
> with a shared database easy and intuitive... and then jumping in to  
> script the other 10% could be done by a specialist.
>
> If anyone has done this already or wants to plan out a library  
> everyone could contribute to, let me know!

Jerry and I are attempting to tackle this problem with Galaxy (blog -  
http://daniels-mara.com/galaxy_blog/).  With Galaxy we are  
introducing a concept called Data Sources, Data Objects and Data  
Maps.  One of the goals of a SQL data source will be to relieve you  
of the need to write any SQL in 99% of the cases.  Tables will become  
data objects that you can treat like others objects in Revolution.   
You can set search criteria, perform all of the CRUD operations  
(create, retrieve, update, delete).  Galaxy will take care of writing  
the SQL for you since it knows all about your db structure internally.

It will also support working with hierarchal data.  For example, if  
you have a table named category with a one-to-many relationship with  
the table items, Galaxy could fetch all categories with their  
associated items.  Galaxy then converts the SQL result set to a  
hierarchal representation internally.  You can then loop through each  
category and it's children items like you might in an xml document.

Data Maps will make moving your SQL (and XML) data to the screen and  
other locations much easier as well.

Galaxy Data Sources are still in the early stage of development but I  
have a completely SQL-less app that I am developing alongside the  
Galaxy Data Source and Data Map libraries.  I hope to post some more  
info on Data Sources and the like at the Galaxy Blog after RevCon West.

Jerry and I will be demonstrating Galaxy at RevCon West for any  
interested in seeing what it is.  There are other portions of Galaxy  
which are pretty far along.

-- 
Trevor DeVore
Blue Mango Learning Systems - http://www.bluemangolearning.com
trevor at bluemangolearning.com