Re: Re[2]: Fwd: Re[2]: New html-element: table3

2007/4/26, Dmitry Turin:
>
> >> Can low-skill users write program (for example, by perl or php),
> >> which convert 3 rational table (from DBMS) into 1 browser table ?
> >> No.
> >> In better case, users can write 3 simple request to DBMS and
> >> merge result into output
> JS> Most DBMS'es can order data such that it can be outputted directly in a
> JS> row-by-row order. At least I have never interacted with a DBMS where I
> JS> couldn't take the output and directly dump it to HTML.
>
> There is always gasket (shim) between SQL (pure DBMS) and HTML (browser).
> Gasket is additional language,
> which is often un-available for low-skill users.
> It's very reasonable to turn job in intermediate language
> into job in SQL.
>
> Pay attention at low-skill users,
> you always think about theory.
> It's possible to do all - in theory,
> but not possible with real low-skill users.

"Low-skill users", as you call them, won't ever be able to make OLAP
cubes in pure SQL.
They'll either use reporting tools (Crystal Reports, MS Reporting
Services, MS Access, Jasper Reports, etc.) or connect their Excel /
Open Office Calc to their database and use pivot tables, and then
export into HTML (or simply copy/paste into their HTML editor).

If they want their site to be generated and connected to the database,
then they need help: either they'll use server-side reporting tools
(Crystal Reports, MS Reporting Services, etc.), server-side "helper
classes" (their must be something in PHP doing what you have in mind,
low-skill users will just have to "connect" this thing instead of
doing bare SQL queries), or client-side scripting.
There's a French company editing an software called WebDev which
allows anyone to develop Web 2.0 sites connected to databases.
According to the editor's web site, it can even produce PHP code for
you!

Let's low-skill users use tools designed for them, or just improve
their skills (that's how everyone began coding, isn't it?)


What worries me about your idea is that once you have a
two-dimensional table, you'll want more dimensions and you'll never
stop adding stuff to HTML, making it more complex and hard to learn
for everyone, even the 95% of people that do not need
multi-dimensional tables.

-- 
Thomas Broyer

Received on Thursday, 26 April 2007 09:45:42 UTC