Symbiosis, of course, meaning two or more organisms living together in a relationship. Biologists define three distinct types of symbiotic relationships: commensalism, where one partner benefits from activities of the other; parasitism, where one lives on another to the detriment of the other; or mutualism, where both organisms benefit from the association. I'm wondering today if these three patterns aren't repeating in the relationship between data (or at least, databases) and applications. Moreover, I'm wondering if the type of relationship isn't subjective.
Why? There's an interesting thread running on the SQL Downunder mailing that started off as discussion about TEXT and NTEXT. A couple of posters offered comments (arrgh and sigh, at least that's what caught my eye) directed at storing XML in database. So now we're exploring, hopefully, why these folks feel that way. For me, its not merely to make a point that storing XML in a database is no more nor no less evil than storing any kind of text data in a database. Rather, I'm really trying to answer the question: what the nature of the symbiotic relationship of data and applications, and is that always a subjective view?
I don't think anybody would really care to debate that their is a symbiotic relationship between data and applications. Without data, applications really don't have a reason to exist, other than as amusements. But then, even the simplest of games requires has stateful data. Checkers? Sure, what position are the checkers in relative to the board and each other. Tic-Tac-Toe? What parts of the octothorpe are unfiled, or have an X or O in them. Don't even get me started on Poker. If you ask any programmer, what does their application do, you always get the same answer told more colorfully: It extracts data, it transforms it, it loads into store and quits. Oh sure, they may never say those words or even talk about in terms of such a pattern, but if you choose to look at theirs works in terms of that pattern, you always see it. Subjective commensalism then, at worst, and maybe objective symbiotic mutualism determined by that happens with the data and the application in their lifetimes together.
But it seems like you if you ask some DBAs their view of the relationship, its always objective parastism. The pattern is extract, poison and corrupt. I'm not saying that this doesn't happen, of course. But I'm not so much of cynic to believe that this is an objective pattern. Nor do I really believe that anybody writes truely parasitic applications that aren't mean to be exactly that. So I must conclude that either I'm so naive that about people that I'm wrong OR that I must reject this point of view. If I'm right, then the worst that can be said about the symbiotic relationship beteween data, and maybe then by extension database, and applications is that the relationship is subjectively parasitic at worst even from the eyes of a DBA and subjective commensalism from the eyes of the developer. Once we can accept that how one views the relationship is subjective, then we already have the answer to the question: the relationship is parasitic, commenalistic or mutualistic soley on how both interpret the results. Nothing more, nothing less.
Maybe this is just one of the reasons that the DBA and Developer never really achieve maximum mutualism in their relationships, either.