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RE: XML vs relational database

• From: Len Bullard <len.bullard@u...>
• To: Sylvain LOISEAU <sylvain.loiseau@w...>, Michael Kay <mike@s...>, xml-dev@l...
• Date: Thu, 16 Aug 2007 09:29:02 -0500

A db such as SQL Server has a so-called 'master db' for tasks once
associated with so-called 'system tables' and a model db for making copies.
.  There is also an msdb for storing system tasks. Then there are local
system tables one might devise for tasks such as multi-level lookup lists or
extensible code lists.

As Noah points out, it is fair to say that XML creates a bit more work where
a structure can't be known in advance, but I thought that was the raison
d'etre for going to relational dbs way back when.   It starts to fall apart
when data is not easily decomposed into tables and recomposed into a
different structure such as a tree.   That was an issue for most of the
immature document database designs of the early 90s and was commented on by
analysts of the time such as Dr. Charles Goldfarb when reviewing some
proposals for these.

len

From: Sylvain LOISEAU [mailto:sylvain.loiseau@w...] 

>> Don't you think there is a structural
>> difference, from this point of view, between XML and DBMS?

> Sure, in SQL all the instances have the same structure, so the structure
> information can be stored separately from the instances.

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