Hi Rainer!

At 15:46 22.01.2003 +0100, you wrote:

>(1)
>why is the statement (as follows) not working any more? Has been accepted
>by IB 6.x,
>and I don't see why it shouldn't bee accepted by firebird 1.5 alpha 5:
>
> select distinct <fieldname> from
> <table> <alias> where .....
> union select <fieldname> from <procedure> ( <alias>.<fieldname2> )
>
>Statement failed, SQLCODE = -206
>
>Dynamic SQL Error
>-SQL error code = -206
>-Column unknown
>- <alias>.<fieldname2> -At line 3, column 71.
>
>Seems that the alias is unknown within the procedures parameter list.

From the documentation I read about union:
"Combines the result of two or more SELECT statements to produce a single,
dynamic table without duplicate rows."

Hence, I think the two selects should be independent of each other, and
that the second select shouldn't know about aliases defined in the first.
I'd say it was an error if this used to work.

>(2)
>There still seems to bee a problem with the automatic/background sweep.
>(fixed bug SF 545725)
>I wrote a program (DELPHI / BDE) transfering data from a server database
>to a client, deleting and inserting
>data from / into the client database. Works fine for the first few times,
>but with each further repetition it takes
>more and more time to disconnect (!) from the client. (Does not occure as
>long a second connection is held to the
>client database, so I believe its due to a process starting when the last
>connection is closed (like sweep?) , and
>this process prevents the disconnect to return until it is terminated.
>This can take more then 12! hours, depending on the sice of the client and
>the amount of data deleted.
>(Is a problem in INTERBASE 6.x as well)

What is the environment this is happening in?

>(3)
>What happend to news.atkin.com ?
>I can't access the server no more, neither by a news account nor using the
>link from the firebird homepage.

Sorry, don't know, I can only confirm your observation.

>(4)
>Where is the right place to post suggestions?
>E.g. It would be very helpfull if Firebird supports a select statement
>simuilar to
>the ORACLE 'select ... connect by prior ... starting with ... ' for
>hirachic datasets.

Try the firebird-devel list at sourceforge.