Documentation Conventions

“Terminology” discusses the use of certain terminology.
“Syntax” explains how syntax is presented.
“Typography” discusses typographical conventions in this document.

Terminology

The Cloudscape documentation uses some specialized vocabulary. Here are some definitions that will help you understand Cloudscape:

environment: How your application interacts with Cloudscape. Sometimes referred to as a framework. The two environments are embedded environment and client/server environment .
embedded environment: When an application starts up an instance of Cloudscape within its JVM, the application is said to run in an embedded environment. In this environment, only a single application can connect to a database at one time, and no network access occurs.
client/server environment: When multiple applications connect to Cloudscape over the network, they are said to run in a client/server environment. Cloudscape runs embedded in a server or connectivity framework that allows multiple network connections. (The framework itself starts up an instance of Cloudscape and, strictly speaking, it is running in an embedded environment; the client applications, however, are not.)

This documentation set includes a glossary at the back of the book Learning Cloudscape: The Tutorial. See that glossary if you have other questions about terminology.

Syntax

SQL-J syntax is presented in modified BNF notation. The meta-symbols of BNF are:


Symbol	Meaning
`\|`	“or.” Choose one of the items
`[ ]`	Enclose optional items.
`*`	Flags items that you can repeat 0 or more times. Has a special meaning in some SQL-J statements.
`{ }`	Groups items so that they can be marked with one of the other symbols, i.e. [ ], \|, or *.
`( ) . ,`	Other punctuation that is part of the syntax.

An example of how SQL-J syntax is presented:

: CREATE [ UNIQUE ] [ BTREE ] INDEX IndexName ON TableName ( SimpleColumnName [ , SimpleColumnName ] * )

Command-line syntax for running Java programs and utilities (as well as examples) always begins with the word java. Substitute for the word java the executable for the JVM you wish to use. For example:

: java COM.cloudscape.tools.ij

could be:

: jview COM.cloudscape.tools.ij

In addition, this documentation uses the JavaSoft/SunSoft style for setting JVM arguments and properties. If you use another JDK, the way you set JVM arguments and properties may be different.

Typography

This manual uses some typographical conventions to highlight elements of the SQL-J language, operating system commands, the Java programming language, and the like.


Typeface	Usage	Examples
Italic	New terms	defined by keys
	File and directory names	C:\cloudscape
	Java class names, objects, and methods	PreparedStatement
	Dictionary objects	The Hotels table
	In syntax, items that you do not type exactly as they appear, but replace with the appropriate name	`CREATE TABLE tableName`
Green, fixed-width	Syntax	`CREATE TABLE tableName`
Blue, fixed-width	SQL-J examples	`SELECT city.getName() FROM Cities`
Blue, fixed-width	Java application examples	`Connection conn = DriverManager.getConnection ("jdbc:cloudscape:toursDB")`
Blue-gray, fixed-width	Comments within examples	`--This line ignored`
All caps	SQL-J keywords -(commands)	You can use a CREATE TABLE statement

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Cloudscape Version 3.0