[DB-SIG] pyformat Parameter Style

[Chris Cogdon]

On Tuesday, May 13, 2003, at 02:31 US/Pacific, M.-A. Lemburg wrote:

> However, I don't understand why the current implementations
> don't use Python's wealth of format characters (and it's formatting
> implementation).

*I* understand why :)

When one is passing data to the SQL backend, it should be up to the 
BACKEND to determine how it is passed, and by that, I mean the python 
interface to the backend. Take this example:

Say I want to store a float into a row. The current way, which works, 
would be to do this:

cursor.execute ( "insert into data ( %s )", my_float )

The interface sees the floating point value, turns that into the 
'appropriate' representation that the SQL syntax accepts, and then 
passes it to the DBMS. Now, it is 'expected' that the interface knows 
what the 'appropriate' format is, and does what's Right. Not only 
should the application writer not know, and not be forced to worry 
about it, but he shouldn't be ALLOWED to worry about it. For example:

cursor.execute ( "insert into data ( %2.2f )", my_float )

Now, why in the world would you ever WANT to strip off the precision 
from the value? It just doesn't make any sense.


I think here's the reasoning for the mistake:

THe '%' operator in python is a DISPLAY formatting operator. Ie, grab a 
value, turn it into a string appropriate for the particular 
application's DISPLAY purposes. However, in the 'pass values to the SQL 
backend' application, we're not displaying anything, but instead 
passing data to the sql backend.

The '%s' and '%(keyname)s' syntax was used because it was convenient, 
did the job, required VERY little coding and didn't interfere with 
anything else. This does not mean that "Oh, since the python % operator 
is used in the interface, that means we can use all the OTHER python 
formatting codes, too"

I agree that the DB-API spec as written implies that the other codes 
can be used too, but I do not think this was the intention and, I would 
argue, given the above reasons, that we do NOT code for this 
circumstance. Using all the python formatting operators does not make 
sense in this circumstance because it should NOT be up to the 
application writer to determine how the data is being passed to the 
backend. It should be up to the interface, which knows a lot more about 
the backend's requirements than the application writer.



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