[sword-devel] Suggestion

[sword-devel@crosswire.org]

Martin Gruner wrote:

> Would it be worth to consider the following thing: 
> Why not build database files from the modules that could be accessed through
> SQL for example(i think no indexing would be necessary then). That should
> provide an easy interface for complex searches, and remove the necessity of
> different formats within sword (though it would also be possible to store the
> original formats inside the databases). One also could merge all the modules
> that were downloaded by a specific user, and create one single database for
> sword on that system, containing all the modules, commentaries etc. It might
> also be possible to etraxt specific parts of the database (for example the
> personal commentary). Sword could use one character encoding scheme within that
> database (unicode?) which covers all the different languages etc., and then
> change the text which is output to the system specific environment. Maybe that
> could be the task of the frontends (bibletime).

I am an experienced programmer, but not a database specialist and this idea
sounds good on the surface.  Could anyone that really knows databases
respond?

Moving to a database would not eliminate indexing, it would simply move the
responsibility of the indexing to the database.  Could an existing cross
platform  database be optimized to facilitate lookups like sword?

I could envision certain functions that would be great using a database,
but I suspect that the built-in indexing that a database uses would be less
efficient than what could be designed for a very specific purpose.

Perhaps a future version of sword may want to look at a database like
structure that could be useful and flexible enough.

By the way, your e-mail was thought provoking, not stupid.  ;-)

--
   Darwin Gregory

   Creation is more scientifically valid than evolution!