[gnome-db] Mergeant Data Dictionary

["Ian D. Stewart" <idstewart compuvative com>]

Dear List,

Rodrigo recommended that I post my ideas for a data dictionary for Mergeant so 
that others, especially Vivian, could comment on them.

For the uninitiated, a data dictionary is a means to model and/or manage a 
database at the data element (or data item, or data object, or field) level.  
Such a dictionary would list infomation such as name, business definition, 
data type, length, precision (where applicable), default values, ranges of 
values, lists of values and data sensitivity (e.g., Public, Confidential, 
etc).

My thoughts for the user interface is a tab in the main display, modeled after 
the Tables and Views tab, with a grid display, where each column represents a 
category of data element metadata, and each row represents a distinct data 
element.

Some of this information (name, scale, data type) is already available within 
the GdaFieldAttributes class.  Other data, such as default values, ranges and 
data sensitivity would need to be handled separately, perhaps within a 
subclass of GdaFieldAttributes.

I am open to suggestions and look forward to some good feedback.


Ian