Relational Model versus XML

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Relational Model versus XML

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Gazareth One Orange Chip Points: 27737 More actions · Answer 1

Stuart Davies (1/24/2013)
Got it right as I thought that "either" was the most probable answer.
Like most people are saying here I think the real answer is "it depends".

"It depends" was the option I was looking for!

Richard Warr SSCertifiable Points: 6968 More actions · Answer 2

Interesting that we currently have four people who picked "neither". I suppose it could all be done in Excel, but.......

DrKiller Right there with Babe Points: 780 More actions · Answer 3

This was a fun guessing question 😀

I first wanted to say XML, because it is like the odd one out and the books online usually use universities in their XML examples..

But then I thought that XML is going to cause a BIG debate, so I trusted the poster will allow everyone for their own opinion 😛

sipas Hall of Fame Points: 3828 More actions · Answer 4

Hugo Kornelis (1/24/2013)
I think the correct answer should be worded slightly differently: "Either one can be appropriate" (italics used to emphasize changed part).

Exactly - it depends on the specific requirements. A slight rewording of the answer makes it a good question.

Nils Gustav Stråbø SSChampion Points: 11259 More actions · Answer 5

You live in the US and need to attend a meeting in Europe. What do you do?

1. Buy a plane ticket?

2. Buy a canoo and paddle across the Atlantic?

Dalton Moore SSC Eights! Points: 879 More actions · Answer 6

Dalton Moore

SSC Eights!

Points: 879

January 24, 2013 at 6:27 am

#1580516

What just happened?

sipas Hall of Fame Points: 3828 More actions · Answer 7

@Nils Gustav:

Not a good analogy because one option is only applicable under extremely unlikely circumstances (e.g. you cannot fly due to a medical condition but you have the time and the capacity to paddle across the Atlantic).

A better analogy would be:

You live in New York (NY) and need to attend a meeting in Columbus (Ohio). What do you do?

1. Fly

2. Drive

3. Neither are appropriate

4. Either one can be appropriate

One option is more likely for most people, but there are circumstances where the other is applicable (e.g. you need to take a lot of equipment with you). So either one can be appropriate, depending on the specific requirements.

Orlando Colamatteo SSC Guru Points: 182293 More actions · Answer 8

Too subjective, really. I was lucky to have guessed correctly. More details were required to make an informed decision. Where was the "It depends" option? 😛

There are no special teachers of virtue, because virtue is taught by the whole community.
--Plato

mtassin SSC-Insane Points: 23099 More actions · Answer 9

Yay! I guessed correctly in the guessing game for a change!

My first thought was.... something like Sharepoint which is basically a relational model with xml.

Since both wasn't an option, I took the one that said either would work.

Didn't like the answer, but it seemed most appropriate.

--Mark Tassin
MCITP - SQL Server DBA
Proud member of the Anti-RBAR alliance.
For help with Performance click this link[/url]
For tips on how to post your problems[/url]

DBA_Dom SSCrazy Points: 2902 More actions · Answer 10

This question does seem to be bringing up a nice discusion. Hopefully that was the idea of it and not to say that with little knowledge about the business and the load on which this system will have, which design would be best.

I agree with Koen and the others for the main puporse of performance. You can create database designs in many different flavors but it all comes down to performance and scalablity.

mkdm Ten Centuries Points: 1098 More actions · Answer 11

The question did say "the relational model or XML". I guessed that a relational database model would most likely be appropriate, applying XML as needed. I'm not going to be too critical of someone else's question, though, until I've posted one or two myself. 🙂

seatedElephant Say Hey Kid Points: 674 More actions · Answer 12

Yes slightly 'loose' question but it gets you thinking. I answered either, as the structure of data for such things as 'admissions' would probably lend itself to a relational solution, and something such as 'news' possibly more an xml solution. Hard to say for sure without the data specs though.

Dave Morris :alien:

"Measure twice, saw once"

Rich Weissler Hall of Fame Points: 3286 More actions · Answer 13

Given the data available, I fell back to the ol' standby answer of N'It depends,' and translated that into the available answer. 🙂

TomThomson SSC Guru Points: 104768 More actions · Answer 14

Interesting question. Interesting answer and somewhat unconvincing explanation. Interesting debate.

I'm inclined to go along with those who said that there isn't enough information in the question to draw a reasnable conclusion - except that there's going to be a lot of highly structured data with pretty tight performance, security, and access control requirements, for which XML is inappropriate and probably also a lot of unstructured data for which a relational model is not really appropriate. There's probably also a lot of formatted text - mostly PDF these days, but there's still plenty of LaTex and PostScript out there on University sites, and older research papers tend to use those (or at least they did last time I looked). So I was slghtly tempted to answer "neither is appropriate" but thought it extremely unlikely that that would be what the question's author wanted. Either on its own won't do the job particularly well, and that elimates three of the options. Oh dear, I've elimated 4 out of 4. Well, with relational I can stick things into blobs so maybe that's the answer that's wanted: it's no worse than any of the other wrong answers, so I chose that. I didn't even think of "I need to do some research, talk to some of the users and some of the providers of content, before even thinking about this question" because that was so far outside the range of options offered. I did think of "I'll use both and a few other things too" but I couldn't see my way to reading that into the "either will do" option.

It's a good question in that it provokes debate: but it's a terrible question in that all four options provided for the answer are unmitigated balderdash. The former is, of course, far more important than the latter.

Tom

sestell1 SSChampion Points: 10230 More actions · Answer 15

Hmm, I would think the answer to this question would be "it depends". Based on my assumptions about the limited information provided, a relational model would seem to be the appropriate choice as there doesn't appear to be any advantage to the XML overhead. It's really just a guess though without knowing a bit more about the data being stored in the database.