Re: Can Sybase and Oracle RDBs be designed in non first normal form? i.e. multivalues

Oracle8 will support array and nested table data types. Release dates for Oracle8 have not been announced but I would guess at q2 or q3 97.

-- 
David J Roth
(My own opinions)

Dan and Clare McLaughlin <danjmcl_at_trader.com> wrote in article
<328A9777.795C_at_trader.com>...


> Hi All,


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> 

> 

> I hope someone out there can resolve a debate I am having with my boss.

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> The debate started when we were discussing the Pick (Universe) database

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> which we are running our legacy application on (and thankfully moving

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> away from). As some of you may know, the Pick/Universe database supports

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> "multi-values" in fields. In other words the database is not in first

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> normal form. During the discussion I stated that a Sybase or Oracle

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> database would never be designed using multi-values. I worked briefly

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> with a Sybase database in my previous job and as far as I could tell

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> this could not be done. My boss claims that you might want to use

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> multi-values in a relational database to de-normalize and improve

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> performance. I am new to this job and was really shocked when I first

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> saw "multi-values" in a so called "relational" Pick/Universe database.

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> In school I was trained on the merits of relational databases and how to

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> de-nornmalize to improve performance, but I thought all relational

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> databases were at least in first normal form. Is a Pick/Universe

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> database really relational? Can Sybase and Oracle databases be designed

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> using multivalues? I appreciate any comments concerning this.

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> 

> 

> Thanks

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> 

> 

> Dan

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>