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[NYC*BUG Announcements]

November 02, 2011
James Lowden on Free Database Systems: What They Should Be, And Why You 
Should Care

6:45 PM, Suspenders Restaurant backroom
111 Broadway in Manhattan
http://www.suspendersbar.com/

Open source databases depressingly mimic proprietary ones. They compete 
on "features". They don`t share code or ideas. They don`t formulate a 
standard a la the IETF and then strive for interoperability. And they 
are not working toward creating a true RDBMS.

RDMBSs are important and technically challenging. It`s time to bring 
database management systems -- MySQL, Firebird, Postgres, Ingres, Rel, 
MonetDB, SQLite, sapdb, et al. -- into the Internet age. Let`s use the 
tools that made the Internet possible to get out of the database doldrums.

Goals for free DMBSs:

0. Community

1. Standard wire protocol

2. Standard API

3. New query language

4. Shared language parser and query optimization library

5. Adopt lessons from Unix about namespaces and interfaces

6. Be the thinking man`s choice

Biography

James K. Lowden works in quantitative research systems at 
AllianceBernstein. He began working with C, C++, and SQL around 1985, 
and NetBSD since 1.5. In his copious spare time he has for many years 
been the maintainer of the FreeTDS project (www.freetds.org).