btn@jupiter.uucp (btn) (01/18/89)
I am looking for a PC database package with a 'C' interface and would very much appreciate hearing from anybody's experience with this package. The criterias that are important to me are stability of the product, speed, whether it runs well in a network environment with multiple users, how good are the tools for debugging and maintaining the data base, whether it will handle very large data base (larger than 100,000 records per files). I would also appreciate hearing about anybody's experience on other PC database package. As usual good or bad experiences are both welcome. Thank you in advance. Bich Nguyen (415) 859-2548
john@stiatl.UUCP (John DeArmond) (01/19/89)
In article <15812@joyce.istc.sri.com> btn@jupiter.UUCP (btn) writes: >I am looking for a PC database package with a 'C' interface and >would very much appreciate hearing from anybody's experience with >this package. The criterias that are important to me are stability >of the product, speed, whether it runs well in a network environment >with multiple users, how good are the tools for debugging and maintaining >the data base, whether it will handle very large data base (larger >than 100,000 records per files). I would also appreciate hearing >about anybody's experience on other PC database package. As usual >good or bad experiences are both welcome. > >Thank you in advance. > >Bich Nguyen >(415) 859-2548 I have experience with C-Tree from FairCom and Btrieve. Quickly, I do not like Btrieve at all. Reasons more numerous to mention here. I have used C-tree extensively and really like it. I built a database server for an on-line system a couple of years ago and was able to service over 10 queries a second with a compaq 386 (16mhz). Each inquiry involved hitting 4 different databases, one of which contained about 200,000 records. Positive attributes are: Very fast. Comes as C source code that you compile. Available for almost any environment. (Faircomm pays for ports to unsupported platforms). Almost bug-free. Low memory overhead. No royalties. Negatives include poor documentation, no example code, you must pay for bug fix upgrades (well, they'll supply a LISTING free). Some upgrades are distributed as user installed manual patches. Fair tech support. Moderately expensive. A totally bullshit license agreement, so flagrantly excessive that only the timid pay any attention to it. C-tree is for those of you who want to get "close to the metal". It is not a high level dbase-like library. On the other hand, you don't pay the code space and speed penalty for features and generality you may not need. All told, I'm pleased with the package. john -- John De Armond, WD4OQC | "I can't drive 85!" Sales Technologies, Inc. Atlanta, GA | Sammy Hagar driving ...!gatech!stiatl!john | thru Atlanta!
meo@stiatl.UUCP (Miles O'Neal) (01/19/89)
I can strongly recommend C-Tree (FairComm). I worked on a project where we were moving from a full relational database under UNIX to C-Tree. The product was about 3 MB of C code; we actually rewrote a lot of it, but that was because the original was so far removed from what we needed. At any rate, the C-Tree stuff is pretty low-level, but one of the Sr. S/W Engrs produced a good high-level interface in just a couple of weeks. The code is not documented much, but is not too hard to read. We ran it under For:Pro, V.2 and Ultrix with no changes, and moved it to a PC with no changes in the database portion. That company has since ported several other products to C-Tree and is still happy with it. It is more portable than some "standard" unix stuff such as Curses. It was fast, even with bigger data bases, and the utilities it lacked, such as dbload and dbunload were easy to write for it. -Miles gatech!stiatl!meo
schanck@harmonica.cis.ohio-state.edu (Christopher Schanck) (01/20/89)
In article <2784@stiatl.UUCP> meo@stiatl.UUCP (Miles O'Neal) writes: >I can strongly recommend C-Tree (FairComm). I worked on a project where I can strongly un-recommend Btrieve; expensive, no source, unheard of liscensing (as I recall), unbeleivably bad docs, etc. It is quick (real quick!!!!) and has multi-user and lan versions. But it is a bitch to program (we used it with TC 1.0 & 1.5). Chris -=- "My brain is NOT a deadlock-free environment!!!!" --- Christopher Schanck, mammal at large. schanck@flounder.cis.ohio-state.edu