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Serious question: Can't someone just add database drivers to Sequel Pro? It's far and away the best Database GUI I've ever used and its reliance on MySQL is ac

by phillmv 15y ago

Serious question: Can't someone just add database drivers to Sequel Pro? It's far and away the best Database GUI I've ever used and its reliance on MySQL is actually keeping me from moving to PostgreSQL full time. (i.e. http://www.sequelpro.com/ http://www.sequelpro.com/ and http://www.sequelpro.com/docs/Source_Code http://www.sequelpro.com/docs/Source_Code - a little crazy they're still on SVN but oh well)

mcrider 15y ago
God I would love this. This really is the best GUI DB client. I use Navicat for PGSQL but its not free and its quite clunky (though to be fair, very powerful). In any case, SQLite and PGSQL support are supposedly in their roadmap.
tvon 15y ago
It's certainly not a small task, but an issue is open here: http://code.google.com/p/sequel-pro/issues/detail?id=362&q=postgres&colspec=ID%20Type%20Status%20Priority%20Milestone%20Owner%20Summary%20Stars http://code.google.com/p/sequel-pro/issues/detail?id=362&#38... Developer input from mid-2011 is towards the bottom, but in short the gist is "that would be great, contributions welcome".
- phillmv 15y ago
  Blargh. If only it were as easy as `gem install pg`. I would totally throw $20 at a kickstarter to pay someone. That's what, optimistically? Two weeks of work? How quickly could we scrounge up $10k? Shit. More like $100, now that I think about it.
  - ddagradi 15y ago
    > If only it were as easy as `gem install pg`. It is with MacRuby, but that's a whole different set of problems :)
    - kennywinker 15y ago
      And with GC on the way out in OS X... MacRuby has their work cut out for them.
      - Groxx 15y ago
        GC is on the way out? I haven't heard that before... have a link?
        ksuther 15y ago
        End of the page here: https://developer.apple.com/library/ios/#releasenotes/ObjectiveC/RN-TransitioningToARC/Introduction/Introduction.html#//apple_ref/doc/uid/TP40011226 https://developer.apple.com/library/ios/#releasenotes/Object... Apple highly encourages using ARC over GC for new development.
        Groxx 15y ago
        Well yeah. One is compiler-assisted reference counting and the other is garbage collection. Reference counting is nearly always faster than garbage collecting, and Apple has generally been a bit obsessed on speed, for however much that has gained them or lost them. Their wording there is suspect though. Interesting - thanks for the link!
        chalst 15y ago
        Reference counting is generally quite a bit slower overall than stop-the-world garbage collection. I guess you meant latency, where reference counting generally has better latency than incremental garbage collection.
josephcooney 15y ago
I've never used Sequel Pro, but I've used plenty of other RDBMS GUIs. What's so special about Sequel Pro? It certainly doesn't look like anything to write home about (compared to say the MS SQL tools).
- phillmv 15y ago
  I can't speak for the MS SQL tools. I used one of them once? and it was extremely lame but I can't comment. Compared to every other RDBMS GUI I've used: It crashes very infrequently. It doesn't randomly slow down whenever I click on something. The settings page is relatively straightforward. There aren't fifteen different windows with different functions. The UI makes sense and is also very straightforward.
  - josephcooney 15y ago
    re: MS SQL Server tools and lame - really? The SQL 2000 tools were pretty basic, but since about 2005 they've been pretty good. I'd be interested to hear what you found lame. I guess maybe you were using something else from MS' cornucopia of GUI database tools (a plethora of wizards inside visual studio, access etc).
    - phillmv 15y ago
      Heh. So, I was rescuing an MS Access application that imperfectly synched from a MySQL instance powering the Rails app from which it got data, that had been exported to MS SQL that was running (surprisingly well) inside a Windows XP VM I was accessing via Remote Desktop Connection. So: I have no idea. I totally forget. It was some really-complicated-looking MS tool that allowed me to look at the table row by row and run some queries :). The guy I was working for set it up; my excuse is I stopped using windows back in 2004.
- jnevelson 15y ago
  There's nothing particularly special about it, except for the fact that it just works significantly better than any other RDBMS GUI program I've ever used. The UI is great, it's fast, it's simple to use, and I've never found a feature I needed that it doesn't already have.
bsg75 15y ago
I would hope there are more reasons that a particular client app that determines your platform choice.
- phillmv 15y ago
  Of course there are. How easy it is to install and maintain. How performant it is. How good are the tools associated with it. I've yet to run into a situation where MySQL was holding me back. Since the only thing postgres has got going for it, from my standpoint, is that my friends prefer it and it is cooler… I think that until I have a better reason I will stick to the one with the better toolset. Right now, Sequel Pro is that tool. I use it almost every single day.
jinushaun 15y ago
It's open source, so anyone can add their own db drivers to it. The problem, as with other open source projects, is that the task is not trivial. (I tried to patch Sequel Pro last year) Which is also why I don't buy the oft-quoted benefit of OSS being that you have access to the source to fix/add things. BS. Oh yeah, last time I checked, Sequel Pro doesn't build in XCode 4.
- pyre 15y ago
  > benefit of OSS being that you have access > to the source to fix/add things The place where this is the most beneficial is when considering businesses looking to invest in a technology. If you invest in a company/software product that goes under, then you could be saddled with a piece of tech that you can't fix bugs for, etc. If it's open source you at least have the chance to do so, even if the community around it collapses and there is no new development. The idea that access to the source is some sort of cure-all is a fallacy, but it may also just be a straw man. I don't know that anyone says that all open source projects are going to be manageable just because the source is available, but they are by definition more manageable than a project with no source available.

by phillmv 15y ago

mcrider 15y ago

God I would love this. This really is the best GUI DB client. I use Navicat for PGSQL but its not free and its quite clunky (though to be fair, very powerful). In any case, SQLite and PGSQL support are supposedly in their roadmap.

tvon 15y ago

It's certainly not a small task, but an issue is open here: http://code.google.com/p/sequel-pro/issues/detail?id=362&q=postgres&colspec=ID%20Type%20Status%20Priority%20Milestone%20Owner%20Summary%20Stars http://code.google.com/p/sequel-pro/issues/detail?id=362&#38... Developer input from mid-2011 is towards the bottom, but in short the gist is "that would be great, contributions welcome".

phillmv 15y ago
Blargh. If only it were as easy as `gem install pg`. I would totally throw $20 at a kickstarter to pay someone. That's what, optimistically? Two weeks of work? How quickly could we scrounge up $10k? Shit. More like $100, now that I think about it.
- ddagradi 15y ago
  > If only it were as easy as `gem install pg`. It is with MacRuby, but that's a whole different set of problems :)
  - kennywinker 15y ago
    And with GC on the way out in OS X... MacRuby has their work cut out for them.
    - Groxx 15y ago
      GC is on the way out? I haven't heard that before... have a link?
      - ksuther 15y ago
        End of the page here: https://developer.apple.com/library/ios/#releasenotes/ObjectiveC/RN-TransitioningToARC/Introduction/Introduction.html#//apple_ref/doc/uid/TP40011226 https://developer.apple.com/library/ios/#releasenotes/Object... Apple highly encourages using ARC over GC for new development.
        Groxx 15y ago
        Well yeah. One is compiler-assisted reference counting and the other is garbage collection. Reference counting is nearly always faster than garbage collecting, and Apple has generally been a bit obsessed on speed, for however much that has gained them or lost them. Their wording there is suspect though. Interesting - thanks for the link!
        chalst 15y ago
        Reference counting is generally quite a bit slower overall than stop-the-world garbage collection. I guess you meant latency, where reference counting generally has better latency than incremental garbage collection.

josephcooney 15y ago

I've never used Sequel Pro, but I've used plenty of other RDBMS GUIs. What's so special about Sequel Pro? It certainly doesn't look like anything to write home about (compared to say the MS SQL tools).

phillmv 15y ago
I can't speak for the MS SQL tools. I used one of them once? and it was extremely lame but I can't comment. Compared to every other RDBMS GUI I've used: It crashes very infrequently. It doesn't randomly slow down whenever I click on something. The settings page is relatively straightforward. There aren't fifteen different windows with different functions. The UI makes sense and is also very straightforward.
- josephcooney 15y ago
  re: MS SQL Server tools and lame - really? The SQL 2000 tools were pretty basic, but since about 2005 they've been pretty good. I'd be interested to hear what you found lame. I guess maybe you were using something else from MS' cornucopia of GUI database tools (a plethora of wizards inside visual studio, access etc).
  - phillmv 15y ago
    Heh. So, I was rescuing an MS Access application that imperfectly synched from a MySQL instance powering the Rails app from which it got data, that had been exported to MS SQL that was running (surprisingly well) inside a Windows XP VM I was accessing via Remote Desktop Connection. So: I have no idea. I totally forget. It was some really-complicated-looking MS tool that allowed me to look at the table row by row and run some queries :). The guy I was working for set it up; my excuse is I stopped using windows back in 2004.
jnevelson 15y ago
There's nothing particularly special about it, except for the fact that it just works significantly better than any other RDBMS GUI program I've ever used. The UI is great, it's fast, it's simple to use, and I've never found a feature I needed that it doesn't already have.

bsg75 15y ago

I would hope there are more reasons that a particular client app that determines your platform choice.

phillmv 15y ago
Of course there are. How easy it is to install and maintain. How performant it is. How good are the tools associated with it. I've yet to run into a situation where MySQL was holding me back. Since the only thing postgres has got going for it, from my standpoint, is that my friends prefer it and it is cooler… I think that until I have a better reason I will stick to the one with the better toolset. Right now, Sequel Pro is that tool. I use it almost every single day.

jinushaun 15y ago

It's open source, so anyone can add their own db drivers to it. The problem, as with other open source projects, is that the task is not trivial. (I tried to patch Sequel Pro last year) Which is also why I don't buy the oft-quoted benefit of OSS being that you have access to the source to fix/add things. BS. Oh yeah, last time I checked, Sequel Pro doesn't build in XCode 4.

pyre 15y ago
> benefit of OSS being that you have access > to the source to fix/add things The place where this is the most beneficial is when considering businesses looking to invest in a technology. If you invest in a company/software product that goes under, then you could be saddled with a piece of tech that you can't fix bugs for, etc. If it's open source you at least have the chance to do so, even if the community around it collapses and there is no new development. The idea that access to the source is some sort of cure-all is a fallacy, but it may also just be a straw man. I don't know that anyone says that all open source projects are going to be manageable just because the source is available, but they are by definition more manageable than a project with no source available.