Re: MV community lawsuits

I always remember that the SYSTEM account pointers had a security level
SYS1/SYS2/SYS3 etc... Some verbs would only work at certain levels.
Whilst this was generally poorly implemented in most MV variants, it could
have been used to give users read-only access at TCL level if it had been
expanded..

I would have liked a user-overrideable attribute in the MD definition that
defined a "minimum" level for the verb to run - expand the SYS1-3 to
SYS1-100 and allow program defnition pointers in the MD and procs to also
have the same security... Hey presto, usable security at tcl! Controlled by
the user account name.

Sadly, unless somebody knows differently.. the account secuity was pretty
much useless - not granular enough.

Another 2 cents into the money box!

Regards
Simon
"Excalibur" <excalibur21@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:cORjf.8864$ea6.7649@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Hi Dawn
> One of the really greate things about English/AQL/whatever is the fact
> that
> it cannot update. This allows it to be used safely by even the most
> useless
> operator.
> In fact the worst thing that was ever done to Pick was the introduction of
> the DELETE verb, effectively an AQL command. Only a unix revhead could
> have
> dreamed up this disaster. It races off with nary a check in the world.
> If
> the user forgot to call his select list then bingo it erases the entire
> file. We had an excellent way of deleting items in the ED prestored
> command
> until somebody added "did you really want to do this" and failed to allow
> the question to be overridden by the prestore. I say excellent because
> only
> people who knew what they were doing could use it.
> Imagine if English could update the whole method of programming Pick would
> have to be thrown out. Business rules would have to be held at the file
> level. Dictionaries would have to be barred from users as they would
> become
> THE FILE DEFINITION and lose their flexibility etc etc.
> Please do not even think about it again.
> Regards
> Peter McMurray
>
> "Jim" <wildcat66@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
> news:2GQjf.3011$nA2.1657@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>> With regards to the first part of your question, the orginal 'english'
>> written by Chandru Murti (Chandru you can correect this if incorrect -
> know
>> you are lurking out there somewhere) - who was with *** in the original
>> Microdata days, and according to an orginal 'English 'Binder' English HAd
>> Update capabilities, but as I remember the story , it did not work well
>> at
>> the time and resourses were concentrated on merely the RETREIVAL'
>> capability - Chandru eventually worked ona project for Ultimate where the
>> 'UPDATE Processor' was originally implemented and later part of Advanced
>> Pick, and to a certain extent D3 todaye
>>
>> Oldies may have additional information on this as welkl
>> "dawn" <dawnwolthuis@xxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
>> news:1133441835.891237.156050@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>> >I started to research the history of the MultiValue query language
>> > because I was trying to figure out why it was so much easier to use
>> > than SQL. I was curious why it didn't evolve into an update language.
>> > I was/am looking into the future of data models and related languages
>> > for query and update. When I embarked on this in 2001, I found the
>> > stories behind the technology fascinating. One area I did not delve
>> > into much is the area of lawsuits. There have been a flood of lawsuits
>> > in the MultiValue world. A couple of them are:
>> >
>> > Pick vs TRW from whom he, uh, obtained the original code
>> > Pick vs Microdata (Pick married the secretary and former girlfriend of
>> > Don Fuller, the President of Microdata)
>> >
>> > and the more recent UniData lawsuits with Pacific UniData, with final
>> > settlements during the acquisition of Informix by IBM IIRC.
>> >
>> > I have read bits and pieces about many others such as Pick vs just
>> > about everyone.
>> >
>> > Since I was supposedly interested in tracing the movement of the
>> > languages and data model, I didn't take many notes on these. Seeing
>> > how many, uh, *seasoned* professionals there on this list, I thought
>> > I'd ask what lawsuits anyone recalls among Pick and Pick-a-like
>> > vendors. It seems like a history worth recording.
>> >
>> > I really have no plans for use of this information -- just curious
>> > right now. What lawsuits does anyone know about or recall? Thanks in
>> > advance. --dawn
>> >
>>
>>
>
>


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