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"Object-relational mapping is a leaky abstraction leading to slow imperative code" So they added REST on top of ORM, few more layers of data transformation and

by hudo 7y ago

"Object-relational mapping is a leaky abstraction leading to slow imperative code" So they added REST on top of ORM, few more layers of data transformation and even leakier abstraction, so poor dev doesn't have to worry about "low level" SQL. I lost count of how many different libs/frameworks i saw that exposed CRUD through HTTP, all failed miserably, because it is actually very dumb idea.

ruslan_talpa 7y ago
postgrest is not (and does not use) a ORM Postgrest is more like a compiler, it takes one language as input (REST) and outputs another language (SQL) as output. It has 0 relation to the ORM concept
- arithma 7y ago
  "ORM" is more like a compiler, it takes one language/(api can be seen as a language) as input and outputs another language (SQL) as output.
  - blondin 7y ago
    totally in agreement with you here. an ORM could also be viewed as a compiler. the original comment didn't deserve the backlash.
- emrhzc 7y ago
  "PostgREST is a standalone web server that turns your PostgreSQL database directly into a RESTful API." How did you manage to understand the completely opposite from the very first definition?
  - ruslan_talpa 7y ago
    Becasue i know the codebase maybe :)? How does the tag line say "postgrest is a ORM" and how am i interpreting it in the exact oposite way?
fiatjaf 7y ago
This is nothing like what you're describing. Postgrest is not an ORM, it just takes rows from your database and sends them to the client. It encourages you to write SQL. Write a decent SQL schema. Write SQL views on top of that schema to provide the rows to your API. Even write SQL functions to modify the data in reaction to client calls! If you hate ORMs and love SQL (specially Postgres, because it's amazing) this is the tool you should be using.
- hudo 7y ago
  Postgrest is RRM actually- rest relational mapper. My point is - exposing db over HTTP (REST, GraphQL, ...) is bad architectural design and idea.
  - cerberusss 7y ago
    So what is the alternative that you propose?
  - ruslan_talpa 7y ago
    between postgrest/postgraphile/hasura there are 30k stars, have all those ppl fallend for this "dumb" idea :)? You say "expose db" and imply that one would directly give access to the core tables and in this way coupling the api to the data model (one should expose only views and stored procedures) and making the api inflexible. Or are you saying this is insecure, and if so, can you describe how one would "break" this?
  - shantly 7y ago
    > My point is - exposing db over HTTP (REST, GraphQL, ...) is bad architectural design and idea. I'm with you that exposing a fairly free-form query language over HTTP seems like something that's gonna bite several someones in the ass pretty hard at some point (GraphQL) but what's that got to do with PostgREST?
    - ruslan_talpa 7y ago
      actually .... :) Postgrest has the same "capabilities" as GraphQL so if one is not carefull and jsut (naively) exposes tables with millions of rows with just postgrest (and no propper indexes) it can get bad fast since the client could create queries that join and return a lot of data. That's why one does not deploy postgrest alone but use it in a setting like this https://github.com/subzerocloud/postgrest-starter-kit https://github.com/subzerocloud/postgrest-starter-kit where you at the proxy level can say things like "return 400 if the client did not provide at least 2 filters for the table" or "allow filtering on column a and b because they have indexes but not on c" But again, those are things to consider when you have datasets exceding hundreds of K or millions, you don't need to care about this when you have tables with 10s of Ks
michelpp 7y ago
> I lost count of how many different libs/frameworks i saw that exposed CRUD through HTTP, all failed miserably, because it is actually very dumb idea. The whole point of HTTP is CRUD (Create Read Update Delete). PostgREST maps the HTTP Methods POST/GET/PATCH/DELETE to SQL's INSERT/SELECT/UPDATE/DELETE.
steve-chavez 7y ago
PostgREST actually pushes you to know your PostgreSQL. It aims to be a transparent, yet safe/sandboxed, layer over PostgreSQL. The generated SQL statements over HTTP requests are there to help reduce SQL boilerplate but you're expected to write custom views, functions, triggers, constraints, etc and understand "low level" pg.
cargoshipit 7y ago
This is a direct mapping of the schema into a REST format to be consumed by frontend applications. It doesn't get much "SQL"ier as far as the frontend is concerned. What alternative would you present?

by hudo 7y ago

ruslan_talpa 7y ago

postgrest is not (and does not use) a ORM Postgrest is more like a compiler, it takes one language as input (REST) and outputs another language (SQL) as output. It has 0 relation to the ORM concept

arithma 7y ago
"ORM" is more like a compiler, it takes one language/(api can be seen as a language) as input and outputs another language (SQL) as output.
- blondin 7y ago
  totally in agreement with you here. an ORM could also be viewed as a compiler. the original comment didn't deserve the backlash.
emrhzc 7y ago
"PostgREST is a standalone web server that turns your PostgreSQL database directly into a RESTful API." How did you manage to understand the completely opposite from the very first definition?
- ruslan_talpa 7y ago
  Becasue i know the codebase maybe :)? How does the tag line say "postgrest is a ORM" and how am i interpreting it in the exact oposite way?

fiatjaf 7y ago

This is nothing like what you're describing. Postgrest is not an ORM, it just takes rows from your database and sends them to the client. It encourages you to write SQL. Write a decent SQL schema. Write SQL views on top of that schema to provide the rows to your API. Even write SQL functions to modify the data in reaction to client calls! If you hate ORMs and love SQL (specially Postgres, because it's amazing) this is the tool you should be using.

hudo 7y ago
Postgrest is RRM actually- rest relational mapper. My point is - exposing db over HTTP (REST, GraphQL, ...) is bad architectural design and idea.
- cerberusss 7y ago
  So what is the alternative that you propose?
- ruslan_talpa 7y ago
  between postgrest/postgraphile/hasura there are 30k stars, have all those ppl fallend for this "dumb" idea :)? You say "expose db" and imply that one would directly give access to the core tables and in this way coupling the api to the data model (one should expose only views and stored procedures) and making the api inflexible. Or are you saying this is insecure, and if so, can you describe how one would "break" this?
- shantly 7y ago
  > My point is - exposing db over HTTP (REST, GraphQL, ...) is bad architectural design and idea. I'm with you that exposing a fairly free-form query language over HTTP seems like something that's gonna bite several someones in the ass pretty hard at some point (GraphQL) but what's that got to do with PostgREST?
  - ruslan_talpa 7y ago
    actually .... :) Postgrest has the same "capabilities" as GraphQL so if one is not carefull and jsut (naively) exposes tables with millions of rows with just postgrest (and no propper indexes) it can get bad fast since the client could create queries that join and return a lot of data. That's why one does not deploy postgrest alone but use it in a setting like this https://github.com/subzerocloud/postgrest-starter-kit https://github.com/subzerocloud/postgrest-starter-kit where you at the proxy level can say things like "return 400 if the client did not provide at least 2 filters for the table" or "allow filtering on column a and b because they have indexes but not on c" But again, those are things to consider when you have datasets exceding hundreds of K or millions, you don't need to care about this when you have tables with 10s of Ks

michelpp 7y ago

> I lost count of how many different libs/frameworks i saw that exposed CRUD through HTTP, all failed miserably, because it is actually very dumb idea. The whole point of HTTP is CRUD (Create Read Update Delete). PostgREST maps the HTTP Methods POST/GET/PATCH/DELETE to SQL's INSERT/SELECT/UPDATE/DELETE.

steve-chavez 7y ago

PostgREST actually pushes you to know your PostgreSQL. It aims to be a transparent, yet safe/sandboxed, layer over PostgreSQL. The generated SQL statements over HTTP requests are there to help reduce SQL boilerplate but you're expected to write custom views, functions, triggers, constraints, etc and understand "low level" pg.

cargoshipit 7y ago

This is a direct mapping of the schema into a REST format to be consumed by frontend applications. It doesn't get much "SQL"ier as far as the frontend is concerned. What alternative would you present?