Re: Database Normalization-Outdated?

"Lisa R. Clary" wrote:
>
> Hi all,
>
> I sort of come from an old school where you should normalize data where you
> can (typically 3rd or 2nd) so that you get the efficiency of normalization
> but not the difficulty of data extraction. Additionally, I always thought
> that putting RI on tables was fairly important (prevention of orphans,
> reliable data, etc.) Recently, a consultant who has published a book about
> SQL
   Do not believe everything which is printed. Unless of course you believe that the authors of 'The little Red Book' or 'Mein Kampf' had the best of vision of how the world should be.  

> is now telling me that there is a better model--that of value pair
> combinations (e.g. variable, value) to which all of the data can be modeled
> without the creation of any extra tables. So instead of the 600 tables now
> (normalized & with RI) should be broken down into 2 tables--one to hold the
> meta data (e.g. variable name and possible values) mapped back to say a
> customer table that has a (variable,value,event code,comment) combination
> describing everything about that customer. The event code for example might
> be 300 - first time customer, 400- wanted removal from mailing list, etc.)
> So in theory, I will have very few columns but many more thousands of
> records. All integrity would be maintained through an application.

  In other words, unmaintainable.  

> Can anyone comment on this methodology? Supposedly, --according to the
> consultant, this is the wave of the future and that "...Oracle Clinicals is
> designed in this fashion" . Why would we spend $$$ to have a flat file
> design? Am I missing something? I don't want to see this travesty happen to
> any of the databases for which I am responsible, but unless I can come up
> with something concrete (aside from the textbooks I used in school) ...it
> will happen (after all, he is published!) Or maybe someone can tell me where
> I can take a course in this style of database modeling.
>
> thanks for your input....
>

 If you want to use pair of values, I suggest you try

    man dbm

 Cheaper than Oracle.

It has its worth for some applications, but then it would make the success (which wasn't obvious from the start) of the relational model totally irrational.   

-- 
Regards,

Stephane Faroult
Oriole Software
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Author: Stephane Faroult
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