Generic table

From: Brian Tkatch <SPAMBLOCK.Maxwell_Smart_at_ThePentagon.com.SPAMBLOCK>
Date: Wed, 08 Nov 2000 22:45:57 GMT
Message-ID: <3a09d52b.723072000@news.alt.net>

A table lists groups. Another lists members. Another is a hash between those two.

Group

---

Id
Name

Member
===

Id
Name

Group_Member

---

Member_Id
Group_Id

Some groups have specific information about each member, anywhere between one and twenty different types of information.

Adding columns to the Group_Member table would seem to require columns for each group, causing the table to have many unneccesary columns for each member. If there are one thosand groups and three hundred had five group specific columns there would be much unused.

Having a table for each group that needs it would answer that problem. However, the amount of tables may be uncontrollable.

A generic table sounds nice, but seems hard to implement, especially when retrieving data and storing different data types.

Any ideas?

Brian Received on Wed Nov 08 2000 - 16:45:57 CST