[Dbix-class] Selecting Mixins with MI

Sam Vilain sam at vilain.net
Mon Aug 1 08:37:18 CEST 2005


John Siracusa wrote:

> I think there's a subtle but important distinction between "perl object
> persistence" and "object-relational mapping."  In once case, the db is a
> "backing store" for your objects.  In the other, your objects are an
> abstracted way to access a (usually preexisting) database.

Terms are a crazy thing, everyone seems to want to use the ones they 
like the most any way they like.

Personally I prefer the terms;

   - Storage Objects, or Database Objects
       for objects that are built around the Database structure, such as
       Class::DBI, Alzabo, DBIx::SearchBuilder, SPOPS, etc.

   - Object Persistence
       for orthogonal systems that don't touch the objects they are
       storing in any way, except perhaps via magic references.  This
       includes Pixie and Tangram.

I think "Object Relational Mapping" does not imply either of these; an 
Object/Relational mapper could work in either direction and is a good 
blanket term to describe both.

The latter term might seem a bit close to "Perl Object Oriented 
Persistence", but they are not quite the same thing, as "Object 
Oriented" refers to a quite different idea than "Object".

If anyone has any suggestions for better terms, or objections to these 
terms, please feel free to raise them now.

Sam.



More information about the Dbix-class mailing list