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Date: Wed, 9 Feb 2011 11:59:21 +0100
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Subject: Why I look into CouchDB
From: "Klamann, Norbert" <norbert.klamann@klamann-software.de>
To: user@couchdb.apache.org
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Hello list,
since some days I dabble with couchdb and want to give you some
background to my potential use cases for which I consider Couch.

In my day job I am a freelancer and work since some 15 years or so
with oracle databases. I think I have knack for relational modelling
and like to to it. Nevertheless the toolchain for web applications is
very complex and so are rollout and deployment problems.

Usecase 1
My wife and I have started a local webservice where we offer a kind of
internet full service agency for the local brick and mortar stores and
companies. To make our own life easier we build the websites with
plone.
Plone offers us slideshows, composite pages (Collage in plone
parlance) and a very clean css-structure and very good html. Plone
sites degrade gracefully when javascript is not available in the
browser. One killer feature is that URLS don't break when we move
documents around in the site. The downside of plone is the very
complex architecture, propagation of content changes (between
development and production) is very hard to do in a granular fashion.
We can live with these shortcomings for the time being, but I am not
to keen to develop db-oriented websites with plone, and I see some
potential in this direction even for our customers.
For this reason I consider django which appeals to my relational
trained brain and is architecturally much cleaner IMO.
Couchdb could offer us an even simpler architecture plus easy
replication. I would need the ability the key benefits of plone and
have no ideas if and how it would be feasable to build them in
Couchdb. So I consider this use case as a remote one, but I would like
to hear ideas.

Usecase 2
To organise our own business we need a kind of very special
CRM-System. We have dozens of information objects with lot of mutual
relations. We have potential customers, we look at their websites and
take notes, we contact them, we have to follow up the contacts, write
bills and configure their websites. We have to track the demands of
our existing customers and so on and so forth. I would like to see an
integrated datastore of all this stuff. Simple replication and offline
usage would be a huge benefit.
In a relational DB this would require dozens of tables and quite
complicated joins. I think it would be doable in django and this was
in fact my first thougt. Neverltheless this seems to be a classical
use case for Couchdb. But there are some obstacles :

I don't know how to build a friendly interface to the data. The
interface should assist with the administrative chores of the
business, the less clicks the better. Listboxes with lookup data
should be pre-populated etc.  Accessibility is not the main concern
here, so a javascript-heavy solution would be acceptable, but I am not
a js-Guru and do not like the language too much. The other day I did
the evently tutorial and I find this stuff very complicated, it
requires a great deal of plumbing.

Maybe Couchdbkit with django is the way to go ? Any thoughts ?

I am well aware that couchdb is moving fast and that I have to invest
time to learn and unlearn things. I would like to hear opinions and
get some pointers for further study.I read the definitive guide one
time (which is certainly not sufficient).

Thanks for listening !
--
Mit freundlichen Gr=FC=DFen

Norbert Klamann
(Gesch=E4ftsf=FChrer)


mailto:Norbert.Klamann@klamann-software.de
Tel: (49) +172/2797723
Fax: (49) +2235/9918299

Firma
Klamann Software Limited
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