
Firefox 4: An early walk-through of IndexedDB - mbrubeck
http://hacks.mozilla.org/2010/06/comparing-indexeddb-and-webdatabase/
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mootothemax
Can someone tell me the difference between what Mozilla are doing here by
ignoring WebDatabase, and Microsoft used to do with their "embrace and extend"
style of thinking?

I realise it's slightly inflammatory to write a comment, but I'm genuinely a
bit put out that Mozilla have decided to go like this.

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mbrubeck
Mozilla is not "ignoring" the Web Database API. Quite the opposite: we are
very vocal about the reasons we are not implementing it. The alternative API
we are promoting is equally open and is being considered by the same standards
body.

This is how the process is supposed to work. Neither API is a standard yet.
They are both at the "Editor's Draft" stage. Now is the right time to try to
influence the eventual standard(s).

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eob
If the HTML5 working draft just specified SQL92, would you jump on board?

It seems like your main complain isn't relational databases, but rather the
fact that the HTML spec, as stands, essentially specifies "whatever SQLite
implemented" as its database specification.

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mbrubeck
Even if the standard said SQL92, the only practical, shippable embedded SQL
database today is SQLite. I don't think browser vendors are itching to
implement their own SQL databases (or if they did, that they would be any more
interoperable than the various relational databases today).

So realistically, if we go the SQL route, what will get is SQLite. SQL is a
great language and SQLite is a great implementation. But Mozilla knows what
happens in the long term when we end up with a web standard that is actually
defined by a single implementation: It becomes very hard for anyone else to
implement the standard interoperably, or for the standard to evolve by design
rather than by accident.

Programming languages are the most complicated standards of all. SQL is good,
but Mozilla thinks it's better to give up the advantages of embedded SQL for a
lower-level API that is more standardizable, and doesn't add another language
to the web stack. (The language we have now - JavaScript - is just starting to
be truly interoperable itself.) IndexedDB can and will be backed by SQLite,
and the SQL language can be built back on at the JavaScript layer where it
will be portable to both SQLite- and non-SQLite backends.

ActiveJS already includes a SQL parser/compiler in pure JavaScript for its in-
memory datastore: <http://activerecordjs.org/>

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blasdel
Everyone using SQLite instead of trying to implement their own independent
interoperable stuff would be fucking awesome. There is very little software
that's anywhere I would say that about, but SQLite belongs in valhalla.
Reimplementing it is too much wank even for the FSF to muster.

Anyone telling me that they were going to implement their own SQLite (
_especially_ a browser vendor) and ship it to millions of users to run
untrusted unsanitized input would get my door smashed into the face, their
nose broken and bleeding. They would deserve it.

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mbrubeck
_> Reimplementing it is too much wank even for the FSF to muster_

This must be a typo, becaus _nothing_ is too much wank for the FSF. :)

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blasdel
Well, the object proof is that there isn't even a vaporware "GNU Embedded SQL"
project.

Unfortunately, there is probably a Rule 34 for these things. Apologies in
advance.

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crististm
Not related to the FF4 but am I the only one to see that FF 3.6.x loses
address bar history?

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InclinedPlane
<http://support.mozilla.com/en-US/kb/Ask+a+question>

