Submissions (e-mail or in person) must be received by Monday, Apr 6 2009 @ 5PM.
Note: The title of this paper is not meant to dilute the sacrifices made during the Vietnam war.
In class we began with some low-level database functions, then wrapped them up into a database class, then demonstrated how we can tie classes to database tables using the Active Record and DAO patterns.
While our DAO class can handle the most common (aka repetitive) cases, to make a really robust, reusable DAO class can be difficult. Ultimately, no DAO class will be able to provide every possible instance of database interaction and ultimately should provide you the ability to execute complex SQL yourself.
This fact alludes to what is popularly called the "Object-Relational Impedance Mismatch." Please quickly review this wikipedia article for a decent description of what this means and why this exists.
Next, read The Vietnam of Computer Science by Ted Neward, who expresses the opinion that we shouldn't waste our time and resources trying to bridge the O/R gap by drawing examples from the Vietnam War (a little ORM is good enough for 80% of our work, no need to go to war about it).
Read the document and write a paper that describes the seven problems between Object-Orientedness and Relational-ness that Neward mentions. Also, please end your paper with your opinionated response to the question, "Is this a big deal or not?"
[end homework 6]