[Using Sakai] sakai-user Digest, Vol 42, Issue 18

[Bryan Holladay]

> This is neat magic, but where can one find the details of how to do such queries? Table names, fields, schema, etc.

Ah, the age old Sakai question.  A lot of this knowledge isn't
documented well and requires a familiarity with Sakai to come up with
these kinds of queries.  Any table for Samigo (Tests & Quizes) starts
with SAM_.  It's broken into two parts: unpublished and published.
However, I wouldn't advise anyone to jump into those tables and try to
learn how it works since they are one of the more complicated set of
tables in Sakai.

> I'd like to make a query that would give the same results as a report that I have defined, so I could just do (automatically) externally from akai, but don't know how to make the repot onto a Sakai database query.

This sounds like a job for Sakai's webservices.  You can create your
own webservices to generate the information you need and update
values.  Depending on how custom your requirements are, you may be
able to use some of Sakai's API instead of just SQL queries.

> This may be a poor approach, since I read that it would be fragile as internal schema can change between releases, but it looks simpler than trying to write new Java code to do this, if I can find the right query(s).

What is it that you are trying to do?  The best step is to see if
Sakai can accommodate it somehow first.  If not, try to find something
close and just make a few modifications.  If it's way in left field
from what Sakai offers, then webservices are usually the path of least
resistance.

> Is there any source of examples of various queries like this that people use, perhaps for utility functions?

There are OOTB webservices in Sakai:
https://source.sakaiproject.org/svn/webservices/trunk/axis/src/webapp/
and externally created services like Steve S.'s:
https://confluence.sakaiproject.org/display/~steve.swinsburg/Additional+web+services+for+Sakai


Thanks,
Bryan