Database Abstractions and Where They Leak

Doctrine DBAL is the most popular relational database abstraction library for PHP. Many developers prefer using a database abstraction since they usually provide a better developer experience than working directly with database drivers. However, despite the best effort of their designers, abstractions often make developers unhappy when it comes to using non-trivial database features. Per Joel Spolsky, "all non-trivial abstractions, to some degree, are leaky". As a quite complex one, Doctrine DBAL leaks in a variety of aspects: drivers, SQL dialects, and schema management specifics. In this talk, I will highlight the most notable inconsistencies of Doctrine DBAL APIs and provide recommendations on dealing with them.

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