Steve Mallett has paid me a huge compliment calling my site the "closest DataLibre site I've seen" although I'm somewhat embarrassed because I'm still a long way from where I want to be.
I'm still thrilled Steve likes where I'm going, though. DataLibre is one the two main drivers (the other being REST) in how I'm implementing Leonardo. In fact, I'm considering describing Leonardo as "a RESTful DataLibre server written in Python".
I received my November copy of HBR today and there was a Forethought article entitled "I Am My Own Database" by Richard T. Watson which is pretty much talking about DataLibre. He describes what is referred to in the article as "customer-managed interaction" or CMI:
Under CMI, when a consumer buys merchandise online, he receives an electronic file that describes his purchases and that can be automatically imported into a database he's installed on his home PC. If he wants to record purchases made earlier or offline, the consumer can obtain an electronic list of common products, like books, and CDs, from the Library of Congress or commercial sources such as the Internet service Gracenote. He also registers an opinion of each purchase by using rating software incorporated into the database. The database remains in the consumer's control at all times, so if he decides that the Led Zeppelin period of his life has irretrievably passed, he can simply change his ratings of Led Zeppelin CDs he's purchased from all sources.
Finally, while writing this entry, it occurred to me that readers of the datalibre-discuss mailing list might be interested in the Forethought article. In true DataLibre fashion, I'll post this entry (along with the permalink) to the list. One feature I want to implement in Leonardo is that kind of "trackback to an email address" feature.