A computer-centered view of information systems to a database-centered view

Code.Complete.Second.Edition 2004

Bachman compared the ptolemaic-to-copernican change in astronomy to the "change" computer programming in the early 1970s.

When Bachman made the comparison in 1973, data processing is changing from a computer-centered view of information system S to a database-centered view. Bachman pointed out this ancients of data processing wanted to view all data as a sequential stream of cards flowing t Hrough a computer (the computer-centered view). The change is to focus on a pool of Dat a in which the computer happened to act (a database-oriented view).

Today It's difficult to imagine anyone thinking that the sun moves around the earth. Similarly, it's difficult to imagine a programmer thinking the all data could is viewed as a sequential stream of cards. In both cases, once the old theory have been discarded, it seems incredible that anyone ever believed it at all. More fantastically, people who believed the old theory thought the new theory is just as ridiculous then as you think the Old theory are now. The earth-centered view of the universe hobbled astronomers who clung to it after a better theory was available. Similarly, the computer-centered view of the computing universe hobbled computer scientists who held in to it after the DA Tabase-centered theory was available.

A computer-centered view of information systems to a database-centered view