Re: sqlite3

[Jean Louis <bugs@gnu.support>]

* Alan Mackenzie <acm@muc.de> [2021-12-11 00:26]:
> Hello, Eli and Emacs.
> 
> On Wed, Dec 08, 2021 at 15:14:08 +0200, Eli Zaretskii wrote:
> > > From: Qiantan Hong <qhong@mit.edu>
> > > Date: Wed, 8 Dec 2021 05:41:17 +0000
> > > Cc: Po Lu <luangruo@yahoo.com>, Eric Abrahamsen <eric@ericabrahamsen.net>,
> > >  cesar mena <cesar.mena@gmail.com>, "emacs-devel@gnu.org" <emacs-devel@gnu.org>
> 
> > > I’m against using sqlite3, or maybe in general any database.
> 
> > Why would you be against adding to Emacs infrastructure that might be
> > useful for some applications?
> 
> Because it can degrade other applications. 

To me the inclusion of PostgreSQL module is making my life and
business so much easier since its inception. Before that I was using
other PostgreSQL Emacs Lisp interfaceses. Usage of such module does
not degrade and did not degrade any other application that I know in
Emacs. 

sqlite3 is lite as compared to PostgreSQL and I think it is blazing
fast. Once can intersect data with speed and I doubt it would be
slower than what Emacs Lisp can do.

My experience with PostgreSQL tells me that information locating is so
much faster than if I would use plain Emacs Lisp without the database. 

> Primarily Emacs is a programmers' text editor, and I would like it
> to stay that way.

SQLite - Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SQLite

Research the subject. Browsers are for Internet browsing and they are
using SQLite. File system is remember also a database, including text
files with ordered data. Don't be afraid.

> Adding database functionality is inessential to that prime function
> (regardless of how important it might be), therefore is a burden to
> that prime function.

Lack of well structured database and by that I mean SQL relational
databases, is and always was a burden to my programming. With
databases I have increased my productivity and minimized programming
efforts, thus gained speed and also much money. Without databases and
connection from withing Emacs I would be lost and would be spending
time. Back in time I have been using web interface on a local Apache
web server, and now I am using exclusively Emacs. I can connect to
remote databases and allow other people connect to my database and by
using Emacs edit all the information, update, delete, query and follow
up with people for sales and other purposes. 

> All things like gnus, org-mode are likewise inessential - they add
> many megabytes to the source-code, greatly increase build time, take
> up key-bindings, space in documentation (hopefully ;-) and so on.

That is possible to solve, there is minimal Emacs I guess in Debian
and this option:

./configure --without-all

and I often use it on remote servers that way.

> Similarly, I would be very unhappy if somebody transformed Emacs into a
> database engine, where its prime features were unusable without the
> database features being built in.  I think this possibility, remote at
> this juncture, should be borne in mind.

Database backed variables may be think of as global variables and they
could be quite comfortable for a programmer with the difference that
such remain persistent in background. 


-- 
Jean

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