Re: Re: [PHP4BETA] PHP 4.0b3 released

Some more notes: =============== 1. Andi is one of the most contributers to the effort of building PHP and Zend, while I (as well as Marko) contributed almost nothing, so I respect and appreciate his opinion. I can't really argue with him, especially when I'm not the one to complete the DB abstraction layer project ("Show me the code!" - Linus Torvalds). 2. I would not mention this stuff if there was not a project in the middle of development. I can't find it now (I searched MARC, un- successfully), but I'm sure that there IS a project to add it to PHP4. There was even a question regarding to its inclusion in beta3, and its maintainer answered that it would not be ready for beta3. My question in my original message was about this project and its status. 3. I never proposed to REPLACE the current DB interface by a new API; It will not only limit you to the lowest common denominator but moreover - will break all the existing applications. What I wrote, was the same as the meaning of the project, to ADD an alternative API which can be used to access all the databases. As Randy already noted, even if you prefer to use this abstraction API, it doesn't limit you to the lowest common denominator, because there are always the "func()" extensions (although I would avoid using these extensions, except for cases of temporary patches for debugging and so on). 4. Aside from the curiousity to know what happened to this project and where did it disappear, and the "cheers" I gave to the core developers, my main purpose in my original message was to bring it to your attention that many PHP users are annoyed by the lack of it. In the beginning I thought that the people I met were unique and that normal users aren't concerned about this issue, but then I saw today's thread of Slashdot about PHP, and found some other PHP users who see it as the main problem of PHP. And don't forget: The motivation here is not only the portability between databases (which is a great point in any case - you can develop at home using MySQL, and deliver to rich users who use Oracle); It's also the learning curve. Learn one API and be able to access any database. 5. And one last thing - many other things could be done by PHPLIB. For example, since PHP lets you deal with sockets, many core functions could be re-written in PHP rather than in C (as part of the core PHP). But they are not. BTW: Do you know who was the maintainer of this project? I don't remember the name, and even not the country, but I think that he was from East-Europe. Anybody? In any case, thank you for your time and attention, -- Eli Marmor