keith, you seem to be having
"theoretical" discussions on
3 or 4 vague phantom topics,
while i'm talking about stuff
which either actually _exists_
or has been solidly proposed.

and there's no sense continuing
when we're so badly out of sync.

so let us summarize and finish.

1.  i have systems, online and off,
which are simple and work nicely.

Yet, they are not in a environment of "hundreds of users"

and "thousands of books". I would like to see your system

working with that many users and books.

Until then your assertions are just as hypothetical

and phantom.

Sorry, facts are facts. 

2.  keith is too busy to code stuff,
but seems to have many opinions.

True enough. But, what is bad about being opinionated. 

I have work with many that, like you, say that what I suggest

is _to complex_ or _overkill_. Though when I did offer

projects that the finally started using their reaction

is "Why were we doing this before". Or two years down the line

the must concede defeat that I was right.

3.  jim likes using bloatware, but is
too cheap to buy commercial-grade.

Cheap shot on your part. No value, in this point of yours!

4.  lee wants someone else to do
all his .html markup for him first.

I can not see any truth in this statement. It takes just

4 lines of html code at the beginning of a plain vanilla text and

one at the end, to change it into an html!

The rest can be done in the his editor!

5.  don knows databases, but hasn't
generalized from his d.p. experience
the conclusion that any system which
requires administrators will become
corrupt because of the power-seekers.

Just because d.p. implementation is far from optimal

does not mean don is copying them or taking their lead.

You should not take a bad design and use that as your model.

If don observes my "hypothetical" design principles and has his

database complex enough he should be on the safe side.

I know how important complexity in database is. I had a project

and the "client" wanted a new feature he had it ten minutes later.

Then said if we cam do this how about doing this. thirty minutes

later everything was online. He ask me how I did it so fast, because

the features seemed to complicated to him. I explained it is all in the

structure of the database. Since the complexity of the database it was easy

to implement the features and that I know how to design a database properly.

You may not have realized this, but hypotheticals are not from just my opinion,

but from over thirty years of working with comptuters and programing things

designed for people to work without them knowing anything about the complexity 

of the system.

Not comment about the rest of your blah, blah top ten. Top five is far more better.

regards

Keith.

6.  tar-pits are sticky places.

7.  sometimes listserves can be too.

8.  i forget what 8 was 4.

9.  number 9, number 9...

10.  you need 10 items for a top-10.

11.  is my favorite number.