Entry level computer course

  • So my sister-in-law took a mandatory computer course at her tech college that covered a little bit of everything. During part of the course, it covered Databases. She thought she'd run some of the stuff past me since I work a bit on everything and a bunch on databases. Most of the questions I couldn't answer, but they where the kind of questions that are abvious once answered.

    eg.

    What kind of database allows you to join tables together..(or something simular)

    my answer:

    WTF?! all databases?!:w00t:

    their answer:

    relational databases

    and like 100 questions like this. they're not hard, but outside of 'memorizing' possible questions, they're hard to figure out.

    No wonder people get so confused with computers, they dumb down stuff so much, it's almost pointless.

    I dought she learned anything from the class. I probably would've failed it.

  • You could argue that flat file databases don't allow you to join things together at the server level, and perhaps you'd be correct, but really all databases have a way (at the client or server) to join things together.

    Might be defensible, but it's certainly arguable as well. Depends on what was taught in the course as to the right answer.

  • You're forgetting that all such courses have an agenda. Depending on the curriculum, the 'right' answer may change. If I'm teaching you about C++, then I'm going to tell you how C++ can solve all the world's problems, and conveniently forget to tell you how it can't solve some. (substitute 'relational databases','XML',whatever topic in place of C++ above)

    At least your sister-in-law is learning the right lesson from her schooling, which is don't trust anyone just because they are a teacher, always check with a source you trust and learn for yourself.

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    "stewsterl 80804 (10/16/2009)I guess when you stop and try to understand the solution provided you not only learn, but save yourself some headaches when you need to make any slight changes."

  • I'd say the course is correct. There are Databases that do not allow joining between objects (hierarchical comes to mind). Tables were introduced by the relational model of databases. You don't often see those outside the mainframe world. Betrieve type databases don't do that either, IIRC.

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