Austin Ziegler wrote:
> Well, it isn't. And most SQL databases are still better structured
> than object databases will ever be.

disclaimer: I have plenty of experience with SQL but none at all with 
object databases.

That being said, it seems to me that OODBs are simply an object-based 
implementation of a relational database, as opposed to the current crop 
of SQL databases which are record-based. Otherwise the concepts between 
OODB and SQLDB seem to map 1-to-1. Instead of rows in tables you have 
objects in a graph. Instead of a foreign key you have a direct pointer 
to an object. Instead of an index on a foreign key (Foo#bar) you keep a 
list of references (Bar#foo[]) in the foreign object.

These are physical implementation details, not major conceptual 
differences. And I fail to see how that makes an OODB inherently 
hierarchical. Of course it's possible to make a hierarchical object 
model but that only reveals the incompetence of the designer, not of 
OODBs as a whole.

Please enlighten me. Thank you.

Daniel DeLorme