Merge Ahead: Introducing the DB2 for i SQL MERGE statement
Karl Hanson of IBM writes:
As any shade tree mechanic or home improvement handyman knows, you can never have too many tools. Sure, you can sometimes get by with inadequate tools on hand, but the right tools can help complete a job in a simpler, safer, and quicker way. The same is true in programming. New in DB2 for i 7.1, the MERGE statement is a handy tool to synchronize data in two tables. But as you will learn later, it can also do more. You might think of MERGE as doing the same thing you could do by writing a program, but with less work and with simpler notation.
Don’t panic, it isn’t merge in the topic map sense but it does show there are market opportunities for what is a trivial task for a topic map.
That implies to me there are also opportunities for more complex tasks, suitable only for topic maps.