This might help (please forgive me if I'm I goof this up or you already
know it *grin*)

A relational database is a collection of data items organized as a set
of tables from which data can be accessed or reassembled in many
different ways without having to reorganize the database tables.

Eloquence from my understanding is built upon B-tree structures.  To
access the data, the engine has to navigate the tree structure of key
values.

This is what is known as a hierarchical database structure, which is
what IMAGE is.

RDBMS have become more prevalent due to several facts, one big one
already mentioned is SQL.  The other is flexibility.

Doing something like adding a field in a hierarchical database can force
changes across the entire application.  Which is typically not the case
with a relational database.

Some shops are willing to live with the limitations because Retrieving
data from Hierarchical databases is historically faster due to the same
organizational structure that limits the flexibility.


Robert Collins
U.S. Sales Consultant
Transoft, Business Solutions Division
Computer Software Group plc
2000 Riveredge Pkwy, Ste 450
Atlanta, GA 30328
Phone #: 706-265-4110 
Cell #:     770-789-1462
fax #:      706-265-1621
www.transoft.com  www.computersoftware.com

-----Original Message-----
From: HP-3000 Systems Discussion [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On
Behalf Of Adam Dorritie
Sent: Thursday, March 02, 2006 3:03 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [HP3000-L] Migration recommendations; PRELIMINARY INQUIRY

On 3/2/06, Charles Finley <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> My understanding is that the Eloquence database engine is written in
the
> same style as a modern RDBMS.  That is, the same code base could have
been
> used to implement an RDBMS.  However, what the programmer sees is the
API
> (Intrinsics, System Calls) not the internals.  RDBMS's are accessed
with
> some API that involves sending SQL statements to access data.
Eloquence is
> not built to use a SQL API. Eloquence is NOT an RDBMS.

I have no understanding of Eloquence's capabilities or internals, but
implying that SQL (although most contenders for the RDBMS title have
implemented it) is the defining characteristic of a relational
database management system is, well, wrong. 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dataphor

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