Development update

Since it is two weeks ago since my last post, I thought it would be a good idea to give a quick update on the development status.

At present, I've tackled all include and linking problems I faced (C++ is rather new to me). The insertion interface is ready, and the API for clients and sensors is near completion.
Last things remaining are the selection interface, an example client and an example sensor.

In a couple of days I hope to publish a package containing the first version.

Development picked up again

Some weeks back I posted that the development of SQLbusRT had started. After some days this task had been postponed to reconsider the architectural design and to do some more theoretical research.

The version I started was programmed in C, which seemed to be a logical choice since there's a good ORTE API in C.

Yesterday I restarted the coding, now with C++ as the language. It's still possible to use the C API for ORTE, but it also allows me to have an object oriented approach.

The following components will be present in the first release:

• A tiny API for writing simple clients and sensors
• An insertion interface, which writes the sensor data to the database
• A selection interface, which handles query requests from clients
• A small example client and sensor

As soon as a package becomes available, I will post a message here on how to retrieve it.

Performance, Reliability and Scalability

It is always nice to be able to say a system "performs well", is very "reliable" or is "scalable". But what do these terms actually mean?

One of the primary goals of my research on SQLbusRT is finding formulas which can predict the performance, reliability and scalability of the system under development, looking at the scenario it is implemented in.

Ofcourse saying "good performance", "very reliable" and "yes it is scalable" does not suffice. The formulas should provide a meaningful outcome, which is comparable to other outcomes.

I might not be clear to everyone. Let me give an example, using something we always like to talk about: the weather.

We can say the weather is good or bad today, but that is just a personal opinion. If we want to compare todays weather with the weather of tomorrow for instance, we need numbers. We can give useful information on the weather by giving:

• The temperature in Degrees Celcius or Fahrenheit (min, max, current)
  
• The humidity in %
  
• The wind speed in km/hour or miles/hour
  
• ...

The same way I would like to say something about the Performance, Reliability and Scalability of the system.

The more I read about it on the net, the more questions come in mind. I already found some scientific articles on the web which might help me, but I'm still looking for some more information. Especially scalability is often rather vague.

If someone knows any clear information on this matter, you're heartily invited to post a comment on this issue. You can help me a lot by doing so. All help is very much appreciated.

PS. I know that performance, reliability and scalability might have different meanings in different situations. Therefore, it is good to know that the system under development is a publish subscribe model with history added. You can find images explaining the architecture in my previous posts. Once again, all help is very much appreciated.