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See the post on BlueSky: https://bsky.app/profile/provisionalidea.bsky.social/post/3lhujtm2qkc2i
According to many comments, the US government DOES use SQL, and Musk is not understanding much what's going on.
SQL is not web-scale
Sounds like he got confused looking at a view of a join.
SELECT holder_name, amount
FROM account JOIN transaction ON transaction.account_id=account.id;
-- WTF!! THERE'S DUPLICATES!!!
Maybe Musk needs to learn about data normalization and natural keys.
I'm curious what the actual data looks like. I've spent quite a bit of time auditing large data systems.
I would expect these databases to be largely denormalized with very wide tables, I would expect them to favour natural keys like a SSNs, and built around per department use cases.
I would not expect them to be highly normalized because then when you need something from another department you need them to ensure consistency.
These systems probably have like 50 years of legacy code or more in them too.
Oh, I'm calling it now. This one is going to be used as an attack of trans people. Throw out the archaic and manual process of updating names in federal databases, and keep it simple by making the records immutable. Then hit them with a lovely
"You MUST use your REAL NAME (MAIDEN NAME) on government forms. If the name does not match, you will be denied."
There are already attempts to make it so your name has to match your birth certificate in order to vote.
Targets both trans rights and women's rights, simultaneously.
They already stopped providing passports to trans people, even if they're willing to use their old name and gender. And I'm sure that policy will end up hurting women that changed their name after marriage as well, it anyone that changed their name for whatever reason.
He did the exact same thing after taking over Twitter, talking about "poorly batched RPCs" in the timeline which makes zero sense because that's obviously not how HTTP works.
The sad thing is Elon regularly shows how much of a very judgmental, "I'm so smart" idiot* he is, but somehow I keep meeting people who think he's a genius. I guess the assumption that money=smart still holds true in the US, despite being disproven time and time again.
*Do we not have a single word for this concept? I come across this kind of person so frequently there really should be one.
I'd bet that the government is probably the largest user of SQL. Unless there are really old systems that predate SQL. I'd imagine they have shitloads of COBOL for example.
"Our databases only store in RAM because I AM THE ELECTRICITY BATTERY MASTER"
Of course. Everyone who's ever used a DB knows it's BS. As long as the data is structured - which it a) is because he was able to make assertions about it and b) fucking Excel files are enough - it CAN be imported and SQL'd on. Even Excel has built in support for fuck's sake, not to mention Python and PowerQuery.
The dude is a self-certified moron - he probably struggles with the concept of PKI, too.
Also that's not how deduplication works.
He means/thinks that SSN is not unique (which is not a problem, just different design).
Of course he's wrong about lots of stuff, just the nerd in me could not not explain it.