How to deal with VFP's local and remote views?

[HankFay]

Having had the opportunity to test the generated virtual tables for a few days, on tables, of max 1.5 GB, I have not seen performance reasons for maintaining virtual tables. Let me emphasize using my DBC's and environment.

Reasons to use virtual tables:

1) the ability to switch backends (to mssql, mysql, oracle, Amazon's Aurora, etc.)

2) the ability to scale the database (using a common, clustered backend, with multiple LSQL instances). (Note: this requires high-speed connections, database tuning, etc.)

3) the ability to select a sub-set of records for the user to work with, based on their search criteria.

...am in the process of removing loads of indices or is it indexes, from my tables. Many existed to optimize view performance and for reporting purposes.

If you are going to do reporting the old-fashioned way (SET RELATION), you will need the same indexes to make this happen.

Can you write a web app that works against tables? Yes: been there, done that.. However, as soon as you run into a table with lots of records, you will want to select from among them for displaying to the user: you're right back to virtual tables.

Will it allow you the flexibility you need to scale, or meet customers' needs for a particular backend database? No.

Will it complicate reporting? Yes.

My $.02.

Hank

[epschaffer@gmail.com]

Hello Hank,

Thanks for enlightening me. I am relieved to have left my Xcase models unchanged

Your $.02. are greatly appreciated, as always!

Ernst