Hello to all on the list.

I am in the process of writing an application to update a program I have
written that is coming out on the market shortly. The update will be
delivered via the Internet. It is broken down into two major parts, i)
update the exe file based on version numbers and ii) update the Firebird
database structure. It is the second part that got me thinking, I can use a
difference script to update the database structure. But I would like to
write a program that would compare the structure of the application database
and a reference database and update the application database based on the
differences. I see that Clever components have a Delphi VCL component that
does just this but I wonder how easy or hard would it be to write a program
to do just this. The application depends heavily on stored procedures for
the business logic. One of the complexities will be the source for stored
procedures and triggers is encrypted so that prying eyes cannot easily see
the coding logic (I know this is not fool proof but good enough). During the
comparison process these can be decrypted and then encrypted again later on.
How would I go about writing a program to update a database from a reference
database.


1. For domains I could query the rdb$domains table.
2. Similarly tor triggers and stored procedures I could do a similar
thing.
3. But what about tables, columns, constraints and domains?

Any ideas as to the best way to go about this? I think this would also be a
good project to open source. I am thinking I would write the application in
Delphi but once the algorithm is figured out it could be ported to any
language that can connect to a Firebird database.

Any thoughts are welcome.

Thomas Clarke
Cyber Sea Incorporated
#6 Kingston Terrace
Flint Hall
St. Michael
Barbados BB11070

voice: (246) 234-9692
email: tclarke@...
web: http://cybersea.biz


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