Louis,

> This is in fact a BIG source of frustration for me in Interbase. I know
> that it is by design and it is to provide a level of consistency, but:

This was done by design, but not all objects behave in this way, a number of
database objects are versioned using formats.
I can't remember why this wasn't applied to SP's or the reasons doing it the
way it was done. I am sure if I do some digging I can find out.

<snip>

> This is one of the main reasons why we will probably swutch to another
> database, e.g. SQL Server, etc. It will be a great pity, because I really
> like IB and the projects I have done on it run beautifully...

1. I don't think SQL Server will allow you to do metadata changes on fly,
but please correct me if I am wrong. Certainly Sybase didn't.
2. If you switched to SQL Server how much would it cost you?

> Isn't there a way to as an optional feature, propagate SP changes

immediately??

Possibly, but as you know Firebird is an OS project, many of the developers
work on it for free.... all the binaries are freely downloadable and
deployable.

IBPhoenix currently generates some money to try and support the work that is
done here by Ann, Claudio, John, Mike, Mark etc but we are not exactly a
cash rich organisation. If you wanted to sponsor, i.e. pay for a feature to
be developed I am sure we would be delighted to directly allocate resources
to the task and try and find a solution. This goes for anybody who has a
specific desire to see something fixed or added. Otherwise we rely on what
the developers want to do, and feel like fixing :-)

Alternatively buying the IBPhoenix CD, or subscribing to it helps to fund
work that is done on this project too.

Regards
Paul