[Zope3-dev] Florent's O-R blog entry

[Gary Poster]

On Aug 23, 2005, at 12:56 PM, Shane Hathaway wrote:

> Gary Poster wrote:
>
>> In conclusion, the nebulous concept of "enterprise" applications  
>> on  Zope does not have a clear cut decision for or against an O/R  
>> mapper  such as Ape.  The cost of O/R mappings is not  
>> inconsequential, and  the advantages are not conclusive.  I hope  
>> that large projects that  the Zope community works on together can  
>> support both, and do not  depend on or exclude their use.  Florent  
>> makes some excellent  observations, and solutions to the problems  
>> he identifies could be  done at a number of layers in the code  
>> base.  Meanwhile, switching  entirely to an O/R back end over  
>> FileStorage or DirectoryStorage  feels like a significant case of  
>> "throwing the baby out with the bath  water".
>>
>
> I would use this argument to support the idea of transparent ZODB- 
> based O/R mapping, which is what Ape does.  With a transparent  
> mapper, users can choose their own storage backend.  The baby is  
> the application code and the bath water is FileStorage/ 
> DirectoryStorage.  Ape keeps the baby 100% intact. ;-)

I strongly disagree that FileStorage/DirectoryStorage is "bath  
water"--something that has served its purpose, and is discardable.  I  
agree that O/R mapping like Ape provides is a great solution for some  
cases (such as the one you listed, and there are others) and allows  
you to transparently replace back ends if it is (or becomes)  
necessary.  It is an exciting idea and technology, and appropriate  
for some use cases.

FWIW, my concluding sentence would have been better written as  
"Meanwhile, deciding that a community project require an O/R back end  
over FileStorage or DirectoryStorage, as Florent argues, feels like a  
significant case of "throwing the baby out with the bath water"."

Gary