I don't quite agree with that. One advantage I see for using SQLite is that you CAN use it as an SQL database for administrative purposes: You can quickly impor

I don't quite agree with that. One advantage I see for using SQLite is that you CAN use it as an SQL database for administrative purposes: You can quickly import/export the data from or into another SQL database, you can quickly generate an ad hoc report, etc. So to me, the SQLite use case is often where the PRIMARY purpose of a database could be served nearly as well with fopen(), but where it's likely that there will be SECONDARY uses for which having a convenient universal access method would be useful. I've even considered writing an external table plugin for SQLite to facilitate diagnostics and reporting of a complex ad-hoc file format I designed so I could get those benefits with a custom data structure; unfortunately, doing that seems somewhat complex in SQLite.