Comments on: PocoData, Servlets and Vaporware

By: alex

alex — Fri, 08 Dec 2006 16:29:45 +0000

I’d be fine with DynAny as far as length is concerned. But, the pronounciation (”die nanny”) is horrible. So, I’m still for DynamicAny.

By: guenter

guenter — Fri, 08 Dec 2006 15:34:37 +0000

Regarding the name: I actually thought about DynAny. It just sounds a bit too CORBA-esque for my taste…

By: alex

alex — Fri, 08 Dec 2006 02:50:36 +0000

I know you are, Paschal. My apologies above go to you and other folks I’ve kept in fog by promising and then not delivering as promised. Also, please be aware that it has nothing to do with Applied Informatics – this is entirely my own fault – I try to do more than physically possible.

By: Paschal

Paschal — Fri, 08 Dec 2006 02:34:10 +0000

I am waiting for servlets. That’s one thing that keeps me thinking seriously of using Java. I may not be able to help you with C++ code but I will give the library some real life tests and provide you with useful feedback.

By: alex

alex — Thu, 07 Dec 2006 22:51:25 +0000

The original idea behind my request was, as Guenter well explained in his example, to do all the possible conversions between PocoData supported types (all PODs, std::string and Poco::Data::BLOB) that make sense. In the particular case you’re mentioning, Poco::Data::BLOB can easily be turned into std::string using char* BLOB::rawContent() member function.
But nothing is infinite and the whole thing can be as general as possible, i.e. if you decide to convert an integer larger than 127 into char, to throw is better than to overflow.

By: Paschal

Paschal — Thu, 07 Dec 2006 19:58:52 +0000

You want to be able to support queries like “select * from any_table” where the data types are unknown at run time. I think most libraries and tools convert every column to string. Then you have to make a decision what to do with data types like Oracle’s RAW, CLOBS and BLOBS.
OTL for example has a function to covert number, dates and floats into string but the function will throw if you try to retrieve a blob which sucks because if you are creating a general purpose query tool you cannot know if a user may decide to do a “select * from table_with_some_blobs”

By: alex

alex — Thu, 07 Dec 2006 16:50:35 +0000

Is the name open for discussion? If so, then I vote for DynamicAny (recently proposed by Peter). I mean, with Futurama and all, Flexo does not sound like a Poco class .

By: guenter

guenter — Thu, 07 Dec 2006 16:05:32 +0000

The rational explanation would be FLEXible Object

By: alex

alex — Thu, 07 Dec 2006 15:17:49 +0000

Hm – now I’m not sure whether you are pulling my leg or working too much

By: guenter

guenter — Thu, 07 Dec 2006 12:30:11 +0000

You know, there once was a TV show called Futurama. It had two robot characters in it: Bender and Flexo...