Re: Need help modeling workflow

Let me better articulate my request, and any comments on six sigma are non-sequitur...

I need to model an event mechanism, where tasks will come into a queue and be processed. My modeling experience suggests to me that the "right" way to represent this is with some sort of EVENT table and an assortment of intersection tables associating this EVENT table with the multitude of other entities which might be involved with an EVENT.

On the other hand, my counterpart on the application side wants a table similar to:

{
EVENT_ID NOT NULL,
KEY1,
KEY2,
...
}

so that the _application_ can determine what goes in the EVENT table and how to deal with its contents.

This goes against everything I know about ER design, but I'm looking for real-world experiences from the forum.

John Bossert wrote:
> I am attempting to model jobs deposited into a queue for subsequent
> processing.
>
> These jobs will possess a diverse range of relationships - some jobs
> involving customers, some with outgoing email, some with workflow. Some
> will be handled by specific users, others will be dequeued by other
> processes. Some events will spawn other events.
>
> The object-oriented (java) developers want a wide-open set of tables
> ("just give me a table with 5 nullable numeric columns and I'll figure
> out what goes in each") which just makes me cringe. At the same time,
> having a spider web of intersection tables between some "event" table
> and (many) various entities seems cumbersome.
>
> Could anyone having implemented such a system give me some suggestions?
> This will be initially implemented under 8i.
>
> Thanks,
>

-- 
John Bossert

In what concerns you much, do not think that you
have companions: know that you are alone in the world.

             -- Henry David Thoreau