[ZODB-Dev] Re: [Zope3-dev] PROPOSAL: ZODB Relationships

[Shane Hathaway]

Phillip J. Eby wrote:
> At 12:24 PM 5/9/03 -0400, Shane Hathaway wrote:
> 
>> True.  We're still tinkering with terminology.  Each call to the 
>> Relationship() constructor names a distinct relationship set.
> 
> Why?  What good is that?
> 
>>   (Oops, I guess the examples in the proposal don't make it possible 
>> for a Relationship to know its name.)
> 
> Why do they need to?
> 
>>   Currently there is no connection between relationship sets, other 
>> than being stored in the same repository.
> 
> What's a relationship "set", and what value does it add?

Those questions are hard to answer.  Maybe if I used the term 
association instead of "relationship set", you'd see what I'm saying:

Each call to the assocation constructor names a distinct association. 
The association constructor should expect an association name as the 
first argument.  There is no connection between associations, other than 
the fact that a shared repository might store links for several 
associations.

I got the term relationship set from a paper on the web.  But the 
vocabulary we've been working with has been limiting.  UML's association 
concept seems a much better fit because it provides a large enough 
vocabulary: association end, link, association name, association class, etc.

Shane