Table Names: Singular or Plural?
Date: Fri, 05 Apr 2002 04:45:40 GMT
Message-ID: <UZ9r8.171034$ZR2.86577_at_rwcrnsc52.ops.asp.att.net>
When modeling data, entities should have singular names - at least according to IE, IDEF1X, etc. For instance, from IDEF1X:
IDEF1X December 21, 1993
Section:3.1.2 Entity Syntax3.1.2 Entity Syntax
...The entity name is a noun phrase that describes the set of things the entity represents. The noun phrase is in singular form, not plural. Abbreviations and acronyms are permitted, however, the entity name must be meaningful and consistent throughout the model...
There are those who insist that table names should be plural. Why, when transforming my logical model to the physical, would I complicate my life by transforming each entity name to a plural? My databases are usually very complicated; the last thing I need is to have a different name for everything. Furthermore, occasionally a client may not provide me with ERWin or another modeling tool, and I'll be forced to produce my ER Diagrams in something like Enterprise Manager which doesn't provide capability to have different logical & physical names - and ER diagrams just don't make any sense with plural names!
Love to hear what happens to other data modelers when there models are implemented.
Thanks!
--Dave Received on Fri Apr 05 2002 - 06:45:40 CEST