3.3.0.txt

New Features

• An association_proxies plugin has been added. This is not a full-blown proxy implementation, but it allows you to write code such as:

  artist.albums.filter{num_tracks > 10}
  

  Without the plugin, you have to call filter specifically on the association’s dataset:

  artist.albums_dataset.filter{num_tracks > 10}
  

  The plugin works by proxying array methods to the array of associated objects, and all other methods to the association’s dataset. This results in the following behavior:

  # Will load the associated objects (unless they are already
  # cached), and return the length of the array
  artist.albums.length
  
  # Will issue an SQL query with COUNT (even if the association
  # is already cached), and return the result
  artist.albums.count
  

• The add_/remove_/remove_all_* association methods now take additional arguments that are passed down to the add*/remove*/remove_all* methods. One of the things this allows you to do is update additional columns in join tables for many_to_many associations:

  class Album
    many_to_many :artists
    def _add_artist(artist, values={})
      DB[:albums_artists].
        insert(values.merge(:album_id=>id,
                            :artist_id=>artist.id))
    end
  end
  
  album = Album[1]
  artist1 = Artist[2]
  artist2 = Artist[3]
  album.add_artist(artist1, :relationship=>'composer')
  album.add_artist(artist2, :relationship=>'arranger')
  

• The JDBC adapter now accepts a :convert_types option to turn off Java type conversion. The option is true by default for backwards compatibility and correctness, but can be set to false to double performance. The option can be set at the database and dataset levels:

  DB = Sequel.jdbc('jdbc:postgresql://host/database',
                   :convert_types=>false)
  DB.convert_types = true
  ds = DB[:table]
  ds.convert_types = false
  

• Dataset#from_self now takes an option hash and respects an :alias option, giving the table alias to use.

• Dataset#unlimited was added, similar to unfiltered and unordered.

• SQL::WindowFunction is now a subclass of SQL::GenericExpression, so you can alias it and treat it like any other SQL::Function.

Other Improvements

• Microsoft SQL Server support is much, much better in Sequel 3.3.0 than in previous versions. Support is pretty good with the ODBC, ADO, and JDBC adapters, close to the level of support for PostreSQL, MySQL, SQLite, and H2. Improvements are too numerous to list, but here are some highlights:

  • Dataset#insert now returns the primary key (identity field), so it can be used easier with models.

  • Transactions can now use savepoints (except on ADO).

  • Offsets are supported when using SQL Server 2005 or 2008, using a ROW_NUMBER window function. However, you must specify an order for your dataset (which you probably are already doing if you are using offsets).

  • Schema parsing has been implemented, though it doesn’t support primary key parsing (except on JDBC, since the JDBC support is used there).

  • The SQL syntax Sequel uses is now much more compatible, and most schema modification methods and database types now work correctly.

• The ADO and ODBC adapters both work much better now. The ADO adapter no longer attempts to use transactions, since I’ve found that ADO does not give a stable native connection (and hence transactions weren’t possible). I strongly recommend against using the ADO adapter in production.

• The H2 JDBC subadapter now supports rename_column, set_column_null, set_column_type, and add_foreign_key.

• Altering a columns type, null status, or default is now supported on SQLite. You can also add primary keys and unique columns.

• Both the ADO and ODBC adapters now catch the native exception classes and raise Sequel::DatabaseErrors.

• Model classes now default to associating to other classes in the same scope. This makes it easier to use namespaced models.

• The schema parser and schema dumper now support the following types: nchar, nvarchar, ntext, smalldatetime, smallmoney, binary, and varbinary.

• You can now specify the null status for a column using :allow_null in addition to :null. This is to make it easier to use the table creation methods with the results of the schema parser.

• Renaming a NOT NULL column without a default now works on MySQL.

• Model class initialization now raises an exception if there is a problem connecting to the database.

• Connection pool performance has been increased slightly.

• The literal_time method in the ODBC adapter has been fixed.

• An unlikely but potential bug in the MySQL adapter has been fixed.

Backwards Compatibility

• The convert_tinyint_to_bool setting moved from the main Sequel module to the Sequel::MySQL module. The native MySQL adapter is the only adapter that converted tinyint columns to booleans when the rows are returned, so you can only use the setting with the native MySQL adapter.

  Additionally, the setting’s behavior has changed. When parsing the schema, now only tinyint(1) columns are now considered as boolean, instead of all tinyint columns. This allows you to use tinyint(4) columns for storing small integers and tinyint(1) columns as booleans, and not have the schema parsing support consider the tinyint(4) columns as booleans. Unfortunately, due to limitations in the native MySQL driver, all tinyint column values are converted to booleans upon retrieval, not just tinyint(1) column values.

  Unfortunately, the previous Sequel behavior was to use the default tinyint size (tinyint(4)) when creating boolean columns (using the TrueClass or FalseClass generic types). If you were using the generic type support to create the columns, you should modify your database to change the column type from tinyint(4) to tinyint(1).

  If you use MySQL with tinyint columns, these changes have the potential to break applications. Care should be taken when upgrading if these changes apply to you.

• Model classes now default to associating to other classes in the same scope. It’s highly unlikely anyone was relying on the previous behavior, but if you have a model inside a module that you are associating to a model outside of a module, you now need to specify the associated class using the :class option.

• Model#save no longer includes the primary key fields in the SET clause of the UPDATE query, only in the WHERE clause. I’m not sure if this affects backwards compatibility of production code, but it can break tests that expect specific SQL.

• Behavior to handle empty identifiers has now been standardized. If any database adapter returns an empty identifier, Sequel will use ‘untitled’ as the identifier. This can break backwards compatibility if the adapter previously used another default and you were relying on that default. This was necessary to fix any possible “interning empty string” exceptions.

• On MSSQL, Sequel now uses the datetime type instead of the timestamp type for generic DateTimes. It now uses bit for the TrueClass and FalseClass generic types, and image for the File generic type.

• Sequel now unescapes URL parts:

  Sequel.connect(ado:///db?host=server%5cinstance)

  However, this can break backward compatibility if you previously expected it not to be unescaped.

• The columns_for private SQLite Database method has been removed.