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Advantage Database Connection Gems

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t12nslookup

24 Sep, 2020 03:38 PM

the "advantage" gem is so bit-rotten and abandoned that it is no longer available to install using "gem install advantage", and last worked only on ruby 1.8.7.

with some minor changes, I've made it work on all versions, up to and including ruby 2.7.0.

the email address of the maintainer no longer works, as I don't believe that he works for sap.com any more (Last visible on the forums in 2013. I believe that SAP bought the Advantage Database Server), and I don't believe that SAP have any reason to want to support this database, as they have better databases to support.

another gem, the "activerecord-advantage-adapter" gem is likewise broken on new versions of ruby, and even after tweaks only worked up until Rails 3.2. I have managed to update it to work on Rails 4+ (testing mostly on Rails6)

While I'm happy to leave them just available for all on github, especially since I'm expecting the take-up of these modules will be really tiny, it might good to have them available for install via rubygems.

Advantage GEM updated to work with newer ruby (still works on 1.8.7)
https://github.com/t12nslookup/advantage

Activerecord-Advantage-Adapter (works up to Rails 3.2):
https://github.com/t12nslookup/activerecord_advantage_adapter

Activerecord-Advantage-Adapter (works after Rails 3.2):
https://github.com/t12nslookup/activerecord_advantage_adapter/tree/rails6

I will be working on a version of the Activerecord-Advantage-Adapter that works on both old and new versions of Rails, in case anyone ever tried to pull in this gem on an old system. One ring to rule them all.

Jon.

1. 1 Posted by t12nslookup on 29 Sep, 2020 12:35 PM

   

   I've merged a version of the adapter that works with Rails 3.2, Rails 4 and beyond.

   https://github.com/t12nslookup/activerecord_advantage_adapter should now work with pretty much any project, hopefully, and the github repository can always be used for any bug reports, if it doesn't

   • Edit

2. Support Staff 2 Posted by sonalkr132 on 29 Sep, 2020 12:59 PM

   

   Hi t12nslookup,

   This a bit complicated. companies generally don't appreciate it when we change the ownership of gem for their proprietary products. do you think you can contact someone from SAP and check if they would be willing to transfer the ownership to you? The site seems to have contact us https://www.sap.com/products/advantage-database-server.html

   perhaps finding someone from sap on twitter who manages their open-source initiate would be more helpful.

   I would also suggest considering a different name than existing gems.

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3. 3 Posted by Jonathan Adams on 29 Sep, 2020 01:29 PM

   

   Hi sonalkr132,

   I updated the Gem for my own personal benefit, and thought it might be
   worthwhile putting the changes back out there, so I'm not particularly
   bothered (it's actually an awful database, IMHO), but I will try to contact
   them as it might be worthwhile for someone else stuck in the same position.

   Thanks

   Jon

   • Edit

4. 4 Posted by Jonathan Adams on 05 Nov, 2020 08:59 AM

   

   Emailing to the tenderapp email address, hopefully it'll get to you.

   Jon

   ---------- Forwarded message ---------
   From: Haag, Fabienne <[email blocked]>
   Date: Wed, 4 Nov 2020 at 16:22
   Subject: RE: Rubygems.org updating gems for Advantage
   To: Jonathan Adams <[email blocked]>

   Hi Jonathan,

   That is great! Thanks for letting me know.

   We do give you the permission to make your contribution.

   Do you need anything specific or is this e-mail enough?

   Kind regards,

   Fabienne

   *From:* Jonathan Adams <[email blocked]>
   *Sent:* Mittwoch, 4. November 2020 17:11
   *To:* Haag, Fabienne <[email blocked]>
   *Subject:* Re: Rubygems.org updating gems for Advantage

   Hi Fabienne, that's a shame.

   the guys who run Rubygems.org would be able to grant me permission, with
   the say-so from your company, even if you can't find the login
   credentials. they should be able to provide you with new credentials as
   well, since you are obviously from the same company, if you'd prefer to
   contact them directly.

   I have an email address for someone at Rubygems.org if that helps?

   Thanks

   Jon

   • Edit

5. sonalkr132 closed this discussion on 30 Nov, 2020 08:20 AM.