Better than dBase (.dbf)

Hi All,

Questions:
1. What is the best database to use in the following application?
2. Could I put the database in RAM memory so the hard drive won't
be busy?

Application:
I build free submarine simulator software for teachers to teach
math and science to children. They perform scientific and
humanitarian missions only!
The database is dBase (.dbf) with 40 records (20k bytes) which hold
the location, speed, depth, course, ... for each contact (ships,
submarines, whales, navigarional aids, ...) The master math engine
(on CPU 1) updates data once every second, and other CPU's (Radar,
Sonar, Ships, Submarines, Aircraft, ...) read the data once every 2
to 8 seconds. I can hear CPU 1 hard drive being very busy. I use
Delphi 5 and 2006. I suspect there is a better database for my
application than dBase!
Any thoughts!

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.

SQLITE?

CHEERS
MIKE

DNIA CZWARTEK 31 MAJ 2007, FRED NAPISA?(A):
> HI ALL,
>;
> QUESTIONS:
> 1. WHAT IS THE BEST DATABASE TO USE IN THE FOLLOWING APPLICATION?
> 2. COULD I PUT THE DATABASE IN RAM MEMORY SO THE HARD DRIVE WON'T
> BE BUSY?
>
> APPLICATION:
> I BUILD FREE SUBMARINE SIMULATOR SOFTWARE FOR TEACHERS TO TEACH
> MATH AND SCIENCE TO CHILDREN. THEY PERFORM SCIENTIFIC AND
> HUMANITARIAN MISSIONS ONLY!
> THE DATABASE IS DBASE (.DBF) WITH 40 RECORDS (20K BYTES) WHICH HOLD
>; THE LOCATION, SPEED, DEPTH, COURSE, ... FOR EACH CONTACT (SHIPS,
> SUBMARINES, WHALES, NAVIGARIONAL AIDS, ...) THE MASTER MATH ENGINE
> (ON CPU 1) UPDATES DATA ONCE EVERY SECOND, AND OTHER CPU'S (RADAR,
> SONAR, SHIPS, SUBMARINES, AIRCRAFT, ...) READ THE DATA ONCE EVERY 2
> TO 8 SECONDS. I CAN HEAR CPU 1 HARD DRIVE BEING VERY BUSY. I USE
> DELPHI 5 AND 2006. I SUSPECT THERE IS A BETTER DATABASE FOR MY
> APPLICATION THAN DBASE!
> ANY THOUGHTS!

[NON-TEXT PORTIONS OF THIS MESSAGE HAVE BEEN REMOVED]

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.

Fred,

EasyTable might be what you are looking for in this process. It allows you to place a table in memory and manipulate the table without performing any processing of the hard drive.

r/Curtis..

Fred < fjhudd%40sbcglobal.net">fjhuddsbcglobal.net> wrote:
Hi All,

Questions:
1. What is the best database to use in the following application?
2. Could I put the database in RAM memory so the hard drive won't
be busy?

Application:
I build free submarine simulator software for teachers to teach
math and science to children. They perform scientific and
humanitarian missions only!
The database is dBase (.dbf) with 40 records (20k bytes) which hold
the location, speed, depth, course, ... for each contact (ships,
submarines, whales, navigarional aids, ...) The master math engine
(on CPU 1) updates data once every second, and other CPU's (Radar,
Sonar, Ships, Submarines, Aircraft, ...) read the data once every 2
to 8 seconds. I can hear CPU 1 hard drive being very busy. I use
Delphi 5 and 2006. I suspect there is a better database for my
application than dBase!
Any thoughts!

---------------------------------
Be a better Heartthrob. Get better relationship answers from someone who knows.
Yahoo! Answers - Check it out.

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Messages in this topic (0) Reply (via web post) | Start a new topic

.

I believe you can use TClientDataSet to create an in-memory database
that can be saved to disk. I haven't ever used it myself, though.

-----Original Message-----
From: delphi-en%40yahoogroups.com">delphi-enyahoogroups.com [mailto: delphi-en%40yahoogroups.com">delphi-enyahoogroups.com] On
Behalf Of Fred
Sent: Thursday, May 31, 2007 1:56 PM
To: delphi-en%40yahoogroups.com">delphi-enyahoogroups.com
Subject: [delphi-en] Better than dBase (.dbf)

Hi All,

Questions:
1. What is the best database to use in the following application?
2. Could I put the database in RAM memory so the hard drive won't be
busy?

Application:
I build free submarine simulator software for teachers to teach math
and science to children. They perform scientific and humanitarian
missions only!
The database is dBase (.dbf) with 40 records (20k bytes) which hold the
location, speed, depth, course, ... for each contact (ships,
submarines, whales, navigarional aids, ...) The master math engine
(on CPU 1) updates data once every second, and other CPU's (Radar,
Sonar, Ships, Submarines, Aircraft, ...) read the data once every 2 to 8
seconds. I can hear CPU 1 hard drive being very busy. I use Delphi 5
and 2006. I suspect there is a better database for my application than
dBase!
Any thoughts!

-----------------------------------------------------
Home page: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/delphi-en/
To unsubscribe: delphi-en-unsubscribe%40yahoogroups.com">delphi-en-unsubscribeyahoogroups.com
Yahoo! Groups Links

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.

Codebase components from http://www.softsand.com/

A complete suite of dBase components that work well under Delphi 5,
including "memory sets" which have "populate" and "reconcile" methods for
transfering to and from disk.

Seems to me you can also set up a "memory drive"; under windows somehow: a
virtual drive that is handled by Windows, resident either in memory or
some swap file. Logically it is a drive, but fort constant disk access it
eliminates the grinding.

> -----Original Message-----
> From: delphi-en%40yahoogroups.com">delphi-enyahoogroups.com [mailto: delphi-en%40yahoogroups.com">delphi-enyahoogroups.com] On
> Behalf Of Fred
>; Sent: Thursday, May 31, 2007 1:56 PM
> To: delphi-en%40yahoogroups.com">delphi-enyahoogroups.com
&gt; Subject: [delphi-en] Better than dBase (.dbf)
&gt;
> Hi All,
>;
> Questions:
> 1. What is the best database to use in the following application?
> 2. Could I put the database in RAM memory so the hard drive won't be
> busy?
&gt;
> Application:
> I build free submarine simulator software for teachers to teach math
>; and science to children. They perform scientific and humanitarian
> missions only!
&gt; The database is dBase (.dbf) with 40 records (20k bytes) which hold the
> location, speed, depth, course, ... for each contact (ships,
> submarines, whales, navigarional aids, ...) The master math engine
&gt; (on CPU 1) updates data once every second, and other CPU's (Radar,
> Sonar, Ships, Submarines, Aircraft, ...) read the data once every 2 to 8
> seconds. I can hear CPU 1 hard drive being very busy. I use Delphi 5
> and 2006. I suspect there is a better database for my application than
>; dBase!
&gt; Any thoughts!
>
&gt;
>
>
>; -----------------------------------------------------
> Home page: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/delphi-en/
> To unsubscribe: delphi-en-unsubscribe%40yahoogroups.com">delphi-en-unsubscribeyahoogroups.com
&gt; Yahoo! Groups Links
&gt;
>
>
>;

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.

Yeah, I second this. Your needs are simple and the dataset small. Just use
what Borland (er, CodeGear) gives you free: TClientDataSet. You can define
all the field defs at design-time, then right click and save the dataset to
a file. Once that is created, just load it at run-time and use it in
memory. Create indexes on the fly and treat it like any other dataset--very
handy! The default format is its own native binary format, but you can
also save it as XML. There's lots of documentation around, but you'll have
to Google it to get all the articles and understand it well.

Then you can say "Good-bye" to the BDE (and hello to MIDAS.DLL).

David Cornelius
Cornelius Concepts, Inc.
http://corneliusconcepts.com <http://corneliusconcepts.com/&gt;
Software Development, Databases, Websites


_____

From: Smith David G (Finance) [mailto: david.g.smith%40state.de.us">david.g.smithstate.de.us]
Sent: Thursday, May 31, 2007 11:09 AM
To: delphi-en%40yahoogroups.com">delphi-enyahoogroups.com
Subject: RE: [delphi-en] Better than dBase (.dbf)

I believe you can use TClientDataSet to create an in-memory database
that can be saved to disk. I haven't ever used it myself, though.

-----Original Message-----
From: delphi-enyahoogrou <mailto:delphi-en%40yahoogroups.com>; ps.com
[mailto:delphi-enyahoogrou <mailto:delphi-en%40yahoogroups.com>; ps.com] On
Behalf Of Fred
Sent: Thursday, May 31, 2007 1:56 PM
To: delphi-enyahoogrou <mailto:delphi-en%40yahoogroups.com>; ps.com
Subject: [delphi-en] Better than dBase (.dbf)

Hi All,

Questions:
1. What is the best database to use in the following application?
2. Could I put the database in RAM memory so the hard drive won't be
busy?

Application:
I build free submarine simulator software for teachers to teach math
and science to children. They perform scientific and humanitarian
missions only!
The database is dBase (.dbf) with 40 records (20k bytes) which hold the
location, speed, depth, course, ... for each contact (ships,
submarines, whales, navigarional aids, ...) The master math engine
(on CPU 1) updates data once every second, and other CPU's (Radar,
Sonar, Ships, Submarines, Aircraft, ...) read the data once every 2 to 8
seconds. I can hear CPU 1 hard drive being very busy. I use Delphi 5
and 2006. I suspect there is a better database for my application than
dBase!
Any thoughts!

-----------------------------------------------------
Home page: http://groups. <http://groups.yahoo.com/group/delphi-en/>
yahoo.com/group/delphi-en/
To unsubscribe: delphi-en-unsubscri
<mailto:delphi-en-unsubscribe%40yahoogroups.com&gt; be%40yahoogroups.com">beyahoogroups.com
Yahoo! Groups Links

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.

I agree completely with most of the respondents here.
My immediate impression too was that your application is a good
candidate for using TClientDataSet to work with the data in-memory
and to easily, if necessary, store updated data when the application
is finished.

An excellent set of articles on TClientDataSet by Cary Jensen is at
the CodeGear site.

Part 1: http://dn.codegear.com/article/28876
Part 2: http://dn.codegear.com/article/28959
Part 3: http://dn.codegear.com/article/29001
Part 4: http://dn.codegear.com/article/29056
Part 5: http://dn.codegear.com/article/29122
Part 6: http://dn.codegear.com/article/29176
Part 7: http://dn.codegear.com/article/29271
Part 8: http://dn.codegear.com/article/29272
Part 9: http://dn.codegear.com/article/29297
Part 10: http://dn.codegear.com/article/29416

--- In delphi-en%40yahoogroups.com">delphi-enyahoogroups.com, "Fred" <fjhudd...> wrote:
&gt;
> Hi All,
>;
> Questions:
> 1. What is the best database to use in the following
application?
> 2. Could I put the database in RAM memory so the hard drive won't
> be busy?
&gt;
> Application:
> I build free submarine simulator software for teachers to teach
> math and science to children. They perform scientific and
> humanitarian missions only!
> The database is dBase (.dbf) with 40 records (20k bytes) which hold
> the location, speed, depth, course, ... for each contact (ships,
> submarines, whales, navigarional aids, ...) The master math
engine
> (on CPU 1) updates data once every second, and other CPU's (Radar,
> Sonar, Ships, Submarines, Aircraft, ...) read the data once every 2
> to 8 seconds. I can hear CPU 1 hard drive being very busy. I use
> Delphi 5 and 2006. I suspect there is a better database for my
> application than dBase!
&gt; Any thoughts!
>

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.

My two cents...

1. What is the best database to use in the following application?

Considering that you only have 40 records, you might not even need a
database. But since you mention two CPU's, I assume you're using two
machines? If you do need some storage, you could use just flat files or a
CSV file to store the the data, which is read when the application start and
saved when the application closes.
However, if you're using the database to share data between two applications
or even two different machines, you might want to use a completely different
approach. One solution would be to create a service to which other
applications can connect. This service would maintain the data and other
applications just communicate with it. (Either through Windows messages,
named pipes, mailslots or TCP/IP.) Basically, this would be some kind of
simple client/server architecture.

2. Could I put the database in RAM memory so the hard drive won't be busy?

Yes, but if it eats up a lot of memory, your application will just swap
between memory and the swap file all the time. Furthermore, if your
application crashes, the data will be lost.

It has not been suggested but it should also be possible to do the same
through ADO and MS Access. For small amounts of records, you'd still get a
good performance out of it and it tends to perform better in general. If you
own MS Office then you also have some good tools to create and maintain this
database. If not, you would need some knowledge about ADO to know how you
can still create an Access table (through ADOX) and create the tables you
need.

You could also use just ADO combined with disconnected datasets. Those are
similar to Borland's TClientDatasets but they rely on ADO instead of MIDAS.
Similar techniques, actually, just different manufacturers.

As an alternative, you could also just store everything in an XML file and
load it in memory on start-up. You won't have easy-to-use data-aware
controls in that case but it's a good approach for a document-based
solution. But if you need to share this data between multiple processes or
machines then this would not be a good solution. (Unless you create a
service and let the service handle the XML file while the other processes
just communicate with the service.
--
With kind regards,

/// Wim,
W.A. ten Brink

On 5/31/07, Fred < fjhudd%40sbcglobal.net">fjhuddsbcglobal.net> wrote:
&gt;
> Hi All,
>;
> Questions:
> 1. What is the best database to use in the following application?
> 2. Could I put the database in RAM memory so the hard drive won't
&gt; be busy?
&gt;
> Application:
> I build free submarine simulator software for teachers to teach
&gt; math and science to children. They perform scientific and
> humanitarian missions only!
&gt; The database is dBase (.dbf) with 40 records (20k bytes) which hold
>; the location, speed, depth, course, ... for each contact (ships,
> submarines, whales, navigarional aids, ...) The master math engine
&gt; (on CPU 1) updates data once every second, and other CPU's (Radar,
> Sonar, Ships, Submarines, Aircraft, ...) read the data once every 2
> to 8 seconds. I can hear CPU 1 hard drive being very busy. I use
> Delphi 5 and 2006. I suspect there is a better database for my
> application than dBase!
&gt; Any thoughts!
>
&gt;
>
>
>; -----------------------------------------------------
> Home page: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/delphi-en/
> To unsubscribe: delphi-en-unsubscribe%40yahoogroups.com">delphi-en-unsubscribeyahoogroups.com
&gt; Yahoo! Groups Links
&gt;
>
>
>;

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

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.

My 3 cents once more. If you want to hold data in memory then another
possibility is to use dynamic array of records. The contents of array
you can read from file, and save to file when it is necessary.

steward%40manscat.com">stewardmanscat.com pisze:
&gt;
>
>
&gt; Codebase components from http://www.softsand.com/
> <http://www.softsand.com/>
>
>; A complete suite of dBase components that work well under Delphi 5,
> including "memory sets" which have "populate" and "reconcile" methods for
> transfering to and from disk.
&gt;
> Seems to me you can also set up a "memory drive"; under windows somehow: a
> virtual drive that is handled by Windows, resident either in memory or
> some swap file. Logically it is a drive, but fort constant disk access it
> eliminates the grinding.
>
&gt; > -----Original Message-----
> > From: delphi-en%40yahoogroups.com">delphi-enyahoogroups.com <mailto:delphi-en%40yahoogroups.com>;
> [mailto: delphi-en%40yahoogroups.com">delphi-enyahoogroups.com <mailto:delphi-en%40yahoogroups.com>;] On
> > Behalf Of Fred
>; > Sent: Thursday, May 31, 2007 1:56 PM
> > To: delphi-en%40yahoogroups.com">delphi-enyahoogroups.com <mailto:delphi-en%40yahoogroups.com>;
> > Subject: [delphi-en] Better than dBase (.dbf)
&gt; >
>; > Hi All,
>; >
>; > Questions:
> > 1. What is the best database to use in the following application?
> > 2. Could I put the database in RAM memory so the hard drive won't be
> > busy?
&gt; >
>; > Application:
> > I build free submarine simulator software for teachers to teach math
>; > and science to children. They perform scientific and humanitarian
> > missions only!
&gt; > The database is dBase (.dbf) with 40 records (20k bytes) which hold the
> > location, speed, depth, course, ... for each contact (ships,
> > submarines, whales, navigarional aids, ...) The master math engine
&gt; > (on CPU 1) updates data once every second, and other CPU's (Radar,
> > Sonar, Ships, Submarines, Aircraft, ...) read the data once every 2 to 8
> > seconds. I can hear CPU 1 hard drive being very busy. I use Delphi 5
> > and 2006. I suspect there is a better database for my application than
>; > dBase!
&gt; > Any thoughts!
> >
>; >
>; >
>; >
>; > -----------------------------------------------------
> > Home page: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/delphi-en/
> <http://groups.yahoo.com/group/delphi-en/>
>; > To unsubscribe: delphi-en-unsubscribe%40yahoogroups.com">delphi-en-unsubscribeyahoogroups.com
> <mailto:delphi-en-unsubscribe%40yahoogroups.com&gt;
> > Yahoo! Groups Links
&gt; >
>; >
>; >
>; >
>;
>

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.

CodeBase is very nice & flexible, but also commercial.
Maybe a good idea is to migrate to SQLite (http://www.sqlite.org/) and
use database located in memory?

steward%40manscat.com">stewardmanscat.com pisze:
&gt;
>
>
&gt; Codebase components from http://www.softsand.com/
> <http://www.softsand.com/>
>
>; A complete suite of dBase components that work well under Delphi 5,
> including "memory sets" which have "populate" and "reconcile" methods for
> transfering to and from disk.
&gt;
> Seems to me you can also set up a "memory drive"; under windows somehow: a
> virtual drive that is handled by Windows, resident either in memory or
> some swap file. Logically it is a drive, but fort constant disk access it
> eliminates the grinding.
>
&gt; > -----Original Message-----
> > From: delphi-en%40yahoogroups.com">delphi-enyahoogroups.com <mailto:delphi-en%40yahoogroups.com>;
> [mailto: delphi-en%40yahoogroups.com">delphi-enyahoogroups.com <mailto:delphi-en%40yahoogroups.com>;] On
> > Behalf Of Fred
>; > Sent: Thursday, May 31, 2007 1:56 PM
> > To: delphi-en%40yahoogroups.com">delphi-enyahoogroups.com <mailto:delphi-en%40yahoogroups.com>;
> > Subject: [delphi-en] Better than dBase (.dbf)
&gt; >
>; > Hi All,
>; >
>; > Questions:
> > 1. What is the best database to use in the following application?
> > 2. Could I put the database in RAM memory so the hard drive won't be
> > busy?
&gt; >
>; > Application:
> > I build free submarine simulator software for teachers to teach math
>; > and science to children. They perform scientific and humanitarian
> > missions only!
&gt; > The database is dBase (.dbf) with 40 records (20k bytes) which hold the
> > location, speed, depth, course, ... for each contact (ships,
> > submarines, whales, navigarional aids, ...) The master math engine
&gt; > (on CPU 1) updates data once every second, and other CPU's (Radar,
> > Sonar, Ships, Submarines, Aircraft, ...) read the data once every 2 to 8
> > seconds. I can hear CPU 1 hard drive being very busy. I use Delphi 5
> > and 2006. I suspect there is a better database for my application than
>; > dBase!
&gt; > Any thoughts!
> >
>; >
>; >
>; >
>; > -----------------------------------------------------
> > Home page: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/delphi-en/
> <http://groups.yahoo.com/group/delphi-en/>
>; > To unsubscribe: delphi-en-unsubscribe%40yahoogroups.com">delphi-en-unsubscribeyahoogroups.com
> <mailto:delphi-en-unsubscribe%40yahoogroups.com&gt;
> > Yahoo! Groups Links
&gt; >
>; >
>; >
>; >
>;
>

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.