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Date: Fri, 29 Oct 2010 06:06:45 -0400
Message-ID: <AANLkTimyoqHybBG0oU0ovRF+ceJfarYkeKjpJ=s_FyDw@mail.gmail.com>
Subject: Re: NoSQL, YesCQL?
From: Vladimir Vivien <vladimir.vivien@gmail.com>
To: dev@cassandra.apache.org
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How about something simpler/more approachable such as a query api that hides
away the drudgery of thrift/avro rpc api?

On Fri, Oct 29, 2010 at 12:56 AM, Vincent Maher <vincent@vincentmaher.com>wrote:

> Hi all
>
> I think this is a great idea. If you take out Thrift, which is where
> the bulk of the n00b installation pain lies, and add a query language
> and a PHP extension then I think Cassandra will go mainstream.
>
> I still need to write a proper blog post for the team but just so you
> all know,  we're happily using Cassie for all sorts of stuff on
> Motribe at the moment.  The work you are doing is changing lives, bit
> by bit, and many more people appreciate it than you realise.
>
> Kind regards,
> _________________________________
>
> Vincent Maher
> Founder, Motribe
> http://motribe.com && http://motribe.mobi
>
> "Accidents don't happen to people who take accidents as a personal
> insult" - Don Corleone
>
> Blogs: http://www.vincentmaher.com
> Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/vincentmaher
> Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/vincent_maher
>
> Mobile: +27 82 998 5412
> Google Talk: flobby1@gmail.com
> Skype Name: vincentmaher
>
>
>
>
> On Thu, Oct 28, 2010 at 10:40 PM, Eric Evans <eevans@rackspace.com> wrote:
> >
> > I don't know about everyone else, but I've been pretty dissatisfied with
> > our API situation for some time.
> >
> > I used to be of the opinion that The Problem was Thrift and The Answer
> > was Avro.  I do still prefer Avro over Thrift as dependencies go, but
> > I've come to the conclusion that the real problem has more to do with
> > the object-oriented RPC pattern that both share in common.
> >
> > I used to think this was a necessary burden in order to expose the full
> > power of our query API in a client agnostic manner, and that it was the
> > job of third-party libraries to wrap this layer to create stable
> > idiomatic interfaces.
> >
> > And, I used to think a vibrant ecosystem of these idiomatic libraries
> > would emerge, but it hasn't.  Truth is we've seen quite a bit of
> > proliferation, and very little critical mass.
> >
> > This shouldn't be construed as criticism levied against library
> > maintainers, on the contrary, I think they've done an amazing job all
> > things considered.  But in my opinion, our RPC interfaces push way too
> > many implementation details client-side, making them brittle and
> > unstable.  This results in unnecessarily complex libraries that are
> > forced to move in lock-step with Cassandra releases, that are never
> > backward compatible, and which are consistently broken during our
> > development cycle.  I think we can provide client maintainers and users
> > with a better experience than this.
> >
> > One solution to this is to implement a server-side query language, with
> > simple language drivers that manage all of the common functionality in a
> > consistent way (statement preparation, connection pooling, etc).
> > Library maintainers would then build their idiomatic interfaces on top
> > of these, (and I imagine, remove a metric crap-ton of code in the
> > process).
> >
> > To this end I've been playing with exactly that.  I have enough to do
> > simple reads and writes, and I have stubbed out drivers for Java and
> > Python.  I'm seeking community feedback to gauge interest, and to
> > satisfy the much needed desire to bike-shed. :)
> >
> > http://github.com/eevans/cassandra/tree/CQL
> >
> > You need to be sure you're checking out the "CQL" branch.
> >
> > This is implemented in the Avro interface so you'll need to pass the -a
> > flag when launching the daemon.
> >
> > It is far from complete, and is surely quite buggy at this stage, take
> > it as a preview or demonstration; it's meant to be a starting point for
> > discussion.
> >
> > There is a bit of documentation on the syntax, you can see that here:
> > http://github.com/eevans/cassandra/blob/CQL/doc/cql/CQL.textile
> >
> > There are some system tests in test/system/test_cql.py that should give
> > you the basic idea, but assuming you have the Avro Python module
> > installed you should be able to just...
> >
> > $ cd drivers/py
> > $ python
> >>>> import cql
> >>>> conn = cql.Connection('Keyspace1', 'localhost', 9160)
> >>>> conn.execute('UPDATE Standard1 WITH ROW("k", COL("c", "hello!"));')
> >>>> print conn.execute('SELECT FROM Standard1 WHERE KEY = "k"')
> > [{u'columns': [{u'timestamp': 1288297508761L, u'name': 'c', u'value':
> > 'hello!', u'ttl': None}], u'key': 'k'}]
> >>>>
> >
> >
> > I've been chewing on all of this for a while so I'm brimming with ideas,
> > but I'll let the dust settle on this email before going any further. :)
> >
> > Thoughts?
> >
> >
> >
> > P.S. Dear Cliff Moon, I apologize.  You were right.
> >
> > --
> > Eric Evans
> > eevans@rackspace.com
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
>


-- 
Vladimir Vivien

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