> Incidentally, I apologise if this came across as overly negative.
> Generally speaking, we are very happy with Firebird as an embedded
> engine. Part of my job, however, is to be (sometimes painfully!)
> aware of the subtle differences between 9+ different SQL engines. So
> when I am doing comparisons like this, every little wart is magnified
> because I know how several other engines do the same thing "better".

Understand. But i'm pretty sure there are opposite cases
where Firebird is "better" :)

> That does not mean that FB is "horrible" by any means, but I do think
> it is good to point these things out - especially in a thread that
> started out comparing FB to PG.

Of course. But your picture with test results useless without description
of the tests itself. Or am i missed something ?

> I should add that our use of FB is unusual in that it has to "look
> like" ALL these other engines as much as possible.

Hmm... not easy job

> The fact that I
> was able to get so close is really a tribute to the quality of the FB
> engine.

Glad to hear that FB is not as bad as it may seem from prior messages :)

> The only really big issues we have at the moment are the
> derived collations problem mentioned above and merge joins for outer
> joins. Everything else is pretty minor.

Can't say much about collations but second problem will be adressed
in v3 (i think)

Regards,
Vlad