Bruce Momjian: The Hard Quadrant

Having worked with databases for 32 years, I have always lived in a world of locks, sharing, and complexity, but sometimes, I look out the window and wonder, “Why does everything have to be so hard?”
After a while, I just give up figuring it out and get back work.

However, a few months ago I watched a video that gave me a new perspective on that question. The video was “The Forgotten Art of Structured Programming” by
Kevlin Henney, and was given on a C++-themed cruise. (Postgres needs one of those someday. wink) Anyway, the
interesting part starts at 1:22:00, and this
slide holds the key to the complexity I could not
previously express.

Kevlin explains that database programming is hard because shared, mutable state is hard. If data is not shared, or not immutable, things are much easier. This means that no matter what new magical tool
or language is created, database programming will continue be hard, and I just have to accept that. One comforting discovery is that
someone else had the same reaction to that slide, which makes me feel better.

PostgreSQL