RE: "to persist data"

["Lauren" <lt34 -at- csus -dot- edu>]

"To persist data" is to use the "persistence" layer.  Here's a Red Hat
description of persistence, but there are many other descriptions of
"persistence" and the "persistence layer."

http://www.redhat.com/docs/manuals/rhea/RHEA-5.0-Manual/developer-guide/ch-p
ersistence.html

I think that persisting data is a new or newish database application concept
to have your application manipulate and hold onto data.  Persistent data is
data and data objects that don't go away when the application is exited.
The data isn't permanently stored on the database (so calling it stored is a
misnomer) or deleted because it is like a work in progress.  

The way I understand it anyway.  The persistence layer holds on to database
routines and objects so that they don't have be re-compiled with each
transaction.  It's a speed thing, I think.  From what you are describing,
one of the tasks that your engineers want to do is to re-populate forms with
the persisted (not stored) data.

To me, it's like a terminate and stay resident (TSR) concept only it's for
databases.  It's a new use on an old word and I think that it would take too
many words to use the concept in documentation without accepting that "to
persist" will persist in applications for awhile, so it needs to be
documentation.  Application engineers know what it means and that's really
what matters.  They understand the concept and they would probably resist
having a technical writer telling them they are using the wrong word.  Since
persisted data is invisible to the user (they see their entries, but not
that anything is persisted), it really doesn't need to be documented for
users, except to describe the "magical" re-occurrence of their data when the
access the application again.

If you want to use a word other than "persist," then you will need to change
the use of the concept "persistence layer."  I really doubt that this is
possible.

Lauren
 

> -----Original Message-----
> From: techwr-l-bounces+lt34=csus -dot- edu -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com 
> [mailto:techwr-l-bounces+lt34=csus -dot- edu -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com] On 
> Behalf Of Nancy Allison
> Sent: Monday, June 04, 2007 10:27 AM
> Cc: techwr-l
> Subject: "to persist data"
> 
> I've just run across the expression "to persist data" -- I 
> find it on the web as well as in the doc I've been asked to work on.
> 
> Here's a web example:
>   
> "Once we have validated, or failed to validate our data, we 
> need to persist it. (Or at the very least we need to make the 
> decisions not to persist it.) We have an number of ways to 
> persist our data depending on the scope of the persistance. 
> For a single webform, we may be persisting the information 
> back into the form input fields. Or we may persist it to a 
> session if we want to data to remain for the entirety of the 
> user's visit. We may even persist it to a database for long 
> term storage.\ "
> 
> While I understand that our geekier siblings are happy with 
> this term, I'd like to stick with English as much as 
> possible. (Is joke! Mostly.)  What does "to persist data" 
> mean? To move it? To retain it unchanged? Is there a Regular 
> English verb that expresses the same meaning?
> 
> Thanks.
> 
> --Nancy
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