"Christopher Browne" <cbbrowne@acm.org> wrote in message
news:bni0s0$10g8ah$1@ID-125932.news.uni-berlin.de...
> "Anthony W. Youngman" <thewolery@nospam.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> > In article <mhMlb.2417$9E1.18525@attbi_s52>, Marshall Spight
> > <mspight@dnai.com> writes
> >>Unless one has data independence, one does not have
> >>this option; one will be locked into a particular
> >>performance model. This is why I found the MV
> >>guy's obvious pleasure at being able to precisely
> >>describe the performance model for his DB as odd:
> >>I thought it a deficit to be able to say what it was;
> >>he thought it an asset.
> >>
> > When you park your car, do you put the chassis on the drive, the
> > engine in the garage, and the wheels in the front garden?
>
> When I park my car, I don't particularly _care_ whether it runs on
> propane, diesel, gasoline, ethanol, or batteries.
Christopher,
You have to remember who you are talking to; Wol is ignorant and stupid. A
car is a physical artifact just as the physical representation of a datum is
a physical artifact. Physical independence is the equivalent to having a
door from the hallway to the garage, a door from the kitchen to the garage,
a door from the back yard to the garage, and car access to the driveway--and
an identical car parked in the back alley just for convenience.
Wol's analogies are dumb because they reflect his intelligence.