Paul Beach wrote:

> ...
> ... I was working at Borland on InterBase when the BDE hove into

view and

> knew the developers of the BDE well. Not that this had any effect on how

the BDE

> interacted with InterBase, since the goal of the design of the BDE was

to support

> multiple database platforms using lowest common denominator behaviour.

In InterBase's

> case this had the effect of making it look like and behave like any

other database, and hiding

> a number of its better capabilities and features.
> ...

Nevertheless, the BDE was what made it possible for us to choose Interbase
(around 1997, or so).
We had a more likely candidate for our RDBMS (already in use in-house) when
we converted our CODASYL database, but the 'false' assumptions that
1) the Borland's BDE would be better suited to Borland's database than the
other database, and
2) that if IB proved not satisfactory we could just switch the engine
without reworking the programs
was (together with a few other arguments) enough to make us start out with
IB. Well, most of our assumptions may have been more or less off - in the
end I'm very happy with our choice. Biggest gripes: having to explain
"Inter-what? never heard about it", and "why aren't you using MS SQL server".
Note: we left the BDE baggage behind years ago, now using IBO with Firebird.


--
Aage J.