Re: [HACKERS] Embedding scripting

On Tue, 3 Jun 1997 18:31:48 -0500 (CDT), bibach@execpc.com wrote:

>   Has anyone thought of making use of an embedded scripting package
>in PostgreSQL?  This would be something along the lines of TCL or
>Guile.  I'd lean towards Guile, personally, as it seems the most
>flexible.  Guile is an embeddable Scheme (a dialect of Lisp)
>interpreter. ...

Sounds good to me!

>   I'm thinking we could intergrate this in with the Postgres parser
>(and probably the SQL Function managing code) to give us all sorts of
>new tricks.  For instance, this might be a nice, easy, powerful way to
>implement some of the extensions to SQL that many commericial packages
>have (ie, variables, loops, conditionals, etc).

Yes, I think the present parser is far too limited!
Not sure how hard it would be to hook in Guile, tho.

>   What does everyone think of something like this?

Make it an option (like Apache modules?) so people who hate the idea
don't have to link it.  I like the idea of adding a single tool, one
that is already known and tested (?), rather than going through the long
painful develop debug cycle (death of a thousand paper cuts) making ad
hoc extensions to the parser.

BTW, regarding embedded SQL, I personally give this a very low priority.
It just *sounds* intrinsically evil to me - like MS Visual GUIfied
language tools that generate template code with here-dummy comments
where you put in your own stuff.  Blechh.  Just my opinion.

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