Date : Mon, 17 Mar 1986 18:22:47 GMT
From : Gumby <salzman%rdlvax.uucp@BRL.ARPA>
Subject: * Database Applications Survey Results *
DBMS Applications Query Results - Summary
First of all, an apology for being sooo late on posting the results.
For those who don't remember ('cause it's been so long), I posted an
article entitled "Database Applications Query" to net.database,
net.micro, net.micro.pc, and net.micro.cpm, in mid January. Overall I
got a really good response to the query - about 30 replys with actual
dbms applications, others that were just interested in the results.
I have organized the results as follows. I have created a table of
DBMS's that contains the name of the DBMS software, the manufacturer
(where known), the host environment it runs in, and a count of how many
people (who responded) using that DBMS.
Next is a table containing the name of the DBMS and the application(s)
it is being used for. This is basically a summarized list of the actual
responses. The most interesting of the responses comes from Relational
Technology Inc. - The company that makes INGRES. Jeff Lichtman was kind
enough to send me a list of RTI's own applications of INGRES - How a
dbms manufacturer uses its own product!! It's in the list of dbms uses.
Most of the dbms applications were pretty standard, such as mailing &
phone lists, inventories, etc. There were a few that were quite
interesting and some requests for some that have not been done.
A few people were interested in bibliographic applications. This is
something that interests me personally, for it is not easy to create a
bibliographic database in a relational dbms. The problems are that you
need to have multiple occurances of some of the fields (such as Authors
and Keyword type fields). It is not good practice to have AUTHOR1,
AUTHOR2, etc., because 1/2 the time you only need 1 author, and one day
you'll find you need 6 when you have room for 5. Also, making an AUTHOR
field 265 characters long and putting them all in there is not quite
efficient either, and you'll have a hard time doing queries. I have been
working on a text based db program for bibliographic searches that
overcomes these problems. Some of the key features are: Text file
database with variable length fields and multiple occurances of a field.
Btree indecies on any desired field - primary key and secondary
(keyword type) keys. I don't want to go into details on that, if anyone
is interested they can mail me.
My own applications are, as I mentioned above, working on bibliographic
type dbms. Along with developing a text based db I have also done some
stuff in dBASE-III using the (yechh) method of having a long character
field. If the format is consistent in that type of schema, searches are
possible (e.g. assume authors or keywords are comma seperated). I also
have my own mailing/phone lists, check book balancing, and an inventory
of my record/tape collection - all in dBASE-II. One other thing I have
done - I worked at Xerox for 2 years - in the Customer Education Dept.
of Business Systems Group (El Segundo), and developed a dBASE-II
application for their National Registration. This was (as far as I was
concerned) taking dBASE-II to its limit. It was/is quite a system (if I
do say so myself). I can't even begin to go into the stuff it did. There
was a lot of house cleaning it did, automatically, printing of various
form letters (on a 2700 laser printer), printing of Certificates, etc.
The database grew quite large and ran very efficiently for what it was
running on (a Xerox 820-II w/a 10meg). Last I heard it was being
converted to dBASE-III. It had to deal with something like 7 .DBF files,
and even more indecies. There are cute ways of doing joins on more than
2 DBF's in dBASE-II (file flipping).
Enough blabbing. If anyone is interested in any of the specific
applications listed later on, send me mail and I will forward the
message containing that applications (then you can get in touch with the
person that sent it). If there are any other questions, feel free to
write. I hope someone finds the results usefull, and Thanks to all that
replied!!!!!
DBMS Query Results - DBMS's Used
Name Company Host Environ Quantity
---- ------- ------------ --------
dBASE-III Ashton Tate PC 7
dBASE-II Ashton Tate CP/M (Z80) 6
Unify ?? Unix 4
Enable ?? PC 1 (dbms like)
Notebook ?? PC 1 (text fms)
Troll ?? Unix/PC 2
Rbase 5000 Micro Rim PC 3
PHACT-DBRM UniPress Unix 1
CONDOR ?? CP/M 1
INGRES RTI VMS/Unix 3
Reflex ?? PC 1
DATARIEVE ?? VMS 1
Mistress Rhodnius (Toronto CN) Unix 1 (rdbms)
Empress Rhodnius Unix 1
Informix RDS Unix 1
DBMS Query Results - Summary of Applications
DBMS Application(s)
---- --------------
dBASE-III Financial, Personnell
"" Checking Tracking, Mailing lists
dBASE-II Invoicing (small mail order) & mailing list
dBASE-III Personal accounting, billing/accounts rec. for rel. org.
dBASE-II/III mailing lists, convention registration, club membership,
Personal Journal/Gen. Ledger, Menu driven system to
enter/edit scenes in a movie, reorder, them, etc.
Enable 'Tickler file' of commitments, file of articles under
review for a journal.
Notebook phonelist, annotated bibliography, list of restraunts,
xmas-card list, summary of research organizations.
dBASE-III MINET TAC db (part of DDN), inventory (looking into
rbase).
Troll Working on a PC port for a pc based network data mngr.
dBASE-II Client useage of group services.
Rbase 5000 Client useage (as above). Rbase: probs with finding info
and math funcs.
PHACT-DBRM Medical applications (no real query language, mainly
library routines).
dBASE-II Inventory Control.
Rbase 5000 mailing lists, medical patient files, research data
CONDOR houshold purchaces, repairs/projects (who, brands,
costs, etc.). Serial Numbers of house items, credit
cards, etc., List of restraunts, list of good condiments
(food).
INGRES bibliographic files, calendar, property inventory.
Reflex text db for desc-diag-treat-prevention of parasitic
organisms.
DATARIEVE stat report generation - db of high school students to
get kids in different outreach groups.
INGRES financial, personnel - budget data, extract onto pc
and run Lotus/dbase/rbase on it.
DBASE-III document tracking
Rbase 5000 matching users req's with a specialist in a field.
Unify property management & acquisition system.
INGRES *RTI's Response*
******************
a. mailing lists
1. 20,000 rows, approximately 60 users
2. 9,000 rows, approximatley 60 users
3. 350 rows, approximately 20 users
b. call tracking - this application is used by our technical support
department. Calls are logged into the system with pertinent
customer information and given a call number. Calls are then
responded to sequentially, first-come first-served. (20 tables,
6500 rows, 10-15 users)
c. calendar - two departments have developed calendar systems to meet
their needs. One tracks the activities of staff. The other main-
tains our training course schedule. (training schedule - 1 table,
124 rows, 30 users) (staff schedule - 5 tables, 1000 rows, 15 users)
d. bug reporting - this is our bug reporting application. All bugs
are entered. Reports generated by the system aid developers in
the task of fixing bugs. (20 tables, 8000 rows, 25 daily users/50
intermittent users)
e. dial-a-bug - this application supports customers. Customers can
dial in to find out what bugs there are. This application notes
bug priority and status. (6 tables, 333 rows, number of users
varies)
f. tool testing -
1. the first application generates drivers to run QA testing.
(6 tables, 925 rows, 20 users)
2. the second application documents QA testing. (7 tables, 4397
rows, 2 users)
g. machine status - this application tracks operating systems used on
machines in the data center. It also logs problems associated
with the machines such as down time and lost files. (5 tables,
20 rows, 2-5 users)
h. accounting - (the minimum number of users with all components
going is 6. The database size is approximately 100MB divided into
90 tables.)
1. general ledger
2. accounts payable
3. accounts receivable
4. commission processing
5. budgets
i. On-line sales demo - this application is used by the sales force
to demo INGRES. (5 tables, 150 rows, 40 users)
j. configuration management - holds entire source code for INGRES
system. Keeps track of changes to the source code. Correlates the
changes with bug fixes. Produces command procedures for building
new versions of the system, and keeps track of which released
version of INGRES corresponds with which versions of the source
files.
1. mainline code (xline: 25 tables, 63,184 blocks; yline: 25
tables, 53,555 blocks)
dBASE-III exam questions for building tests
Mistress time sheets, customer info, customer contact info,
space acct, cpu acct, equip rec's & val's, invoice info
job info (due dates, shipping dates, etc)., font recs.
dBASE-II golf handicapping
Unify/Informix customer mailing lists, customer calls, hardware &
software conf, RMA's.
Empress sales lists, purchasing info, shipping info, support.
Troll proect management, mailing lists, trouble reporting.
Unify inventory, telephone directory, project sched/track.
Applications with no DB yet
o Track to results of CAI software - try to categorize student responses
according to some criteria.
o "Super-imposed codeword indexing schemes", build an intelligent
bibliographic retrieval system.
(END!).
--
* Isaac Salzman (Gumby)
* Research Development Labs (RDL)
* Culver City, California, 90230
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