Re: Normalization, Natural Keys, Surrogate Keys

From: Bernard Peek <bap_at_shrdlu.com>
Date: Tue, 21 May 2002 13:59:24 +0100
Message-ID: <U40qmJ4sSk68EwYs@shrdlu.com>

In message <3ce97890$1_12_at_news.teranews.com>, Pablo Sanchez <pablo_at_dev.null> writes
>
>"--CELKO--" <71062.1056_at_compuserve.com> wrote in message
>news:c0d87ec0.0205201359.120ca460_at_posting.google.com...
>> >> The SSN is a surrogate key itself, and a BAD one at that. There
>are
>> duplicates out there. <<
>>
>> With Mexican illegals in Calfornia, Texas and other states,
>
>Singling out one ethnic group isn't very productive.... oh well ...
>amazing ... no, actually it's not ...
>
>Businesses operated by good old American citizens are generating
>duplicate social security numbers for illegal aliens.

In the UK the SSN is issued by the government and is usually based on the persons place and time of birth. We still had duplicates, even before we had a significant number of illegal immigrants.

If you really need a surrogate key that you can trust implicitly then you need to issue it yourself.

-- 
Bernard Peek
bap_at_shrdlu.com

In search of cognoscenti

Received on Tue May 21 2002 - 07:59:24 CDT