Perl.com: Short guide to DBI (The Perl Database Interface Module)

Oct 26, 1999, 01:24 (4 Talkback[s])
(Other stories by Mark-Jason Dominus)

"Relational databases started to get to be a big deal in the 1970's, and they're still a big deal today, which is a little peculiar, because they're a 1960's technology."

"A relational database is a bunch of rectangular tables. Each row of a table is a record about one person or thing; the record contains several pieces of information called fields..."

"Sometimes this is a very silly way to store information. When the information naturally has a tabular structure it's fine. When it doesn't, you have to squeeze it into a table, and some of the techniques for doing that are more successful than others. Nevertheless, tables are simple and are easy to understand, and most of the high-performance database systems you can buy today operate under this 1960's model."

Complete Story

Related Stories:

• Web Techniques: Programming with Perl: Have You Ever Meta-Index Like This?(Oct 25, 1999)
• M2 Presswire: Open Text introduces BASIS JDBC and BASIS Perl DBI Drivers(Oct 07, 1999)
• LinuxFocus: Perl part I(Sep 19, 1999)
• Linuxcare: Dear Lina: Pulling the Perl From the Linux Shell(Sep 16, 1999)