RDB and other plain-text databases

[martinklepsch]

Maybe a worthy addtition to the list of plain text databases. Couldn't find much else than this though: http://www.drdobbs.com/rdb-a-unix-command-line-database/199101326

[schmidt-fu]

Nice find! With a search for "Rdb Walter Hobbes" I found a working draft of the paper:

https://compbio.soe.ucsc.edu/rdb/

[dbohdan]

This looks interesting. I have only skimmed the Dr. Dobb's article so far, but it seems that RDB is very similar to the more recent GNU Recutils.

The download at ftp.rand.org is dead, however, I found that you can still download the version mentioned in the article from a mirror. It is apparently the latest. I'll check it out later. I'll also gladly hear about your experience if you try it.

[dbohdan]

http://hopper.si.edu/wiki/mmti/Starbase

Note 2018-04-08: Can't be recommended due to licensing oddities. The source archive includes this statement in radar/LICENSE:

SLALIB/C/O is proprietary software. Your free-of-charge personal
license is provided on an understanding of non-disclosure to third
parties, and covers non-profit astronomy research applications only.
Though you may make the software available to immediate colleagues in
object form (for example as compiled applications or as a linkable
library), you must not place the source code where copies can be made
by others who may assume it is freeware. In particular, it must not
become visible on the Web, whether as text files or in archived form.

(emphasis mine)

[dbohdan]

shsql — interesting, GPLv2+, but the source code and binaries are only available upon request. (Why?) A much older version (v1.28 from 2005 vs. the latest v1.4 from 2013) is archived in the Wayback Machine.

[dbohdan]

https://github.com/josegonzalez/bash-filedb (not single-file)

[dbohdan]

There is a maintained derivative of RDB called (confusingly, but they used the name first) "NoSQL".
http://www.strozzi.it/cgi-bin/CSA/tw7/I/en_US/nosql

[dbohdan]

Let us not forget (but not actually add) QuineDB.