[Senior Devs] Amarok and SQL queries

[Soren Harward]

On Sun, Nov 1, 2015 at 6:15 AM, Olivier Churlaud <olivier at churlaud.com> wrote:
> I wonder: why are the mysql libraries directly used and not the Qt framework
> (QSqlQueries and so on)?

IIRC, it's entirely historical.  For a handful of reasons that were
valid in 2008 but aren't any longer, the decision was made late (and
kind of hastily, IMO) in the 2.0-beta cycle to switch from SQLite to
MySQL Embedded.  At the time, SQL performance through the Qt libraries
was pretty lousy and unstable, and I don't think Qt supported MySQL
Embedded at the time.  At any rate, relying on a SQL database for
Amarok 2's library has always been a non-ideal solution, but the only
one that's actually worked.  There were several failed attempts at a
Nepomuk back end.  Now, it would be nice to have Amarok work
seamlessly with Baloo, because that would eliminate the collection
scanner, which has always been the the source of Amarok's biggest
problems in terms of database performance.  But Baloo's emphasis on
light weight (with good reason) means that Amarok is always going to
need some kind of database to store all its internal information.

-- 
Soren Harward