Actually Queryable Executables

gist

Farid Zakaria's follow-up to SELF shows that if the executable is a writable SQLite file, the running program can store its own state there transactionally. self-httpd is a single-file webserver whose code, routes, visitor log, and button presses live in one database; the live demo at selfdb.exe.xyz is that file. Against redbean's ZIP-plus-Lua portable executable, handlers are SQL rows, live edits are transactions, FTS5 indexes the site from inside itself, and a redeploy is INSERT...SELECT then scp of one file.

ideas

• The running program can store state in itself. Because SELF is a writable SQLite file, application state can live next to segments, collapsing /var, /tmp, and /home into one transactional file.
• self-httpd is program, site, and log. routes holds page bodies; visits and presses are written back while the server runs; the live selfdb.exe.xyz page queries its own segments and symbols on each request.
• Queryable versus portable. Redbean is an Actually Portable Executable (ZIP plus Lua); SELF is an Actually Queryable Executable—the container is the database, and a handler is a new row.
• Live edits and deploys are SQL. UPDATE routes changes the running site without reload; sqldiff audits a deploy; FTS5 indexes pages in-process; a redeploy migrates visits with INSERT...SELECT, then scp of one file.
• argv[0] is the database. binfmt_misc execs the interpreter, not the file, so /proc/self/exe is not usable yet; self-exec passes the path as argv[0] and drops its connection so the program can open itself.

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