Re: Keeping old revisions of data?

        Since you plan on keeping the actual documents outside of the database all you
have to do is add a column for effective date/time the revision took effect to your
table. This will allow you to reconstruct any document for a given point in time
even if a document consists of several other documents.

        As you can see using this scheme you can store boiler plate clauses and
paragraphs and use them to create documents on the fly.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Original Message <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<

On 7/14/00, 10:51:22 AM, criscokid_at_v-wave.com.nospam (Dave Kimmel) wrote regarding Keeping old revisions of data?:

> What is the best way to keep old revisions of data in a relational
> database?
 

> I am designing a new database to store a document collection at work.
> Currently, each document has an entry in a meta-data table which
> contains things like the title, keywords, the parent document,
> etc. The actual documents are stored in operating system level
> files.
 

> Now, there are *many* problems with this system. A number of them are
 

> limitations of the database that I'm using, such as the 8K row size
 limit,
> hence the need to store documents outside the database if I want to be
 

> able to run a search on them.
 

> I figure I can get around all of these without too much trouble.
 

> My main problem is this: Since these are legal documents that define
> the policies and procedures that the office uses, and since these
> policies and procedures change over time, we need to store all of the
> old revisions of the documents. These also need to be able to be
> retrieved quickly.
 

> Does anyone have experience with something like this? What would be
> the best way to approach this?
 

> Thanks!
> -- Dave Kimmel
> criscokid_at_v-wave.com
> ICQ: 5615049
Received on Sat Jul 15 2000 - 00:00:00 CEST