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badcomputer.org

Wednesday, September 13, 2006

comp.lang.python.humour or, How I Learned to Spit Coke on my Keyboard

About a week ago on comp.lang.python one mensanator@aol.com sent a diatribe to the list trashing Sqlite3 using all manner of condecension and name calling. Specifically, he called Sqlite 'goofy' and called its author a 'crackpot'. Now, it seems the crux of this guy's beef was that he had been bitten by Sqlite's dynamic typing and automatic type coercion, and thought the documentation should be clearer. Fair enough, but after being told by others suitable workarounds to enforce types, and that he could effect some change better by bringing it up on the Sqlite list or submitting a doc patch, he started ranting even more, claiming that Sqlite should not even call itself SQL, since it didn't conform to the SQL standard (hint: there is not a single major database that does conform, including Oracle, Sybase, MySql, MsSql and PostgreSQL).

So anyway, I had already written the guy off as a troll by this point, but what surprised me was that other people started agreeing with him and parroting his arguments (but generally in a nicer tone). Predictably, a major flamefest ensued. Now, I'm of the opinion that if someone writes some useful code and releases it for free for the world to use, they deserve some manner of respect, and at the very least deserve for users to read the docs and understand how it works. After all you are certainly free not to use it. Why does this guy have to go on a mindless rant trash-talking the code and the code's author because it doesn't work the way he expects it to?

In any event, the whole reason I brought this up is because a fellow named Tim Chase, presumably in an effort to bring some levity to the proceedings, posted a fantastic RDBS song to the tune of Gilbert and Sullivan's Major General. You often hear about people spitting coke on their keyboard when they read something funny, but it had never happened to me. Until now. Here's the lyrics:

I am the very model of a modern major database,
For gigabytes of information gathered out in userspace.
For banking applications to a website crackers will deface,
You access me from console or spiffy user interface.

My multi-threaded architecture offers you concurrency,
And loads of RAM for caching things reduces query latency.
The data is correctly typed, a fact that I will guarantee,
Each datum has a data type, it's specified explicitly.

Thanks for the laugh Tim! Here is his SQL song on the list archives and also the original rant that started it all.

PS: I didn't actually spit coke, I don't drink coke, it was iced tea. And I didn't spit it on my keyboard, I just dribbled some on my shirt...

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