Re: Table design question

Mike Sherrill <MSherrillnonono_at_compuserve.com> wrote in message news:<roq4105vmg6e99ia967nikgp4541m73ekv_at_4ax.com>...
> On Fri, 23 Jan 2004 09:08:49 +0100, Karel Miklav
> <karel_at_inetis.spppambait.com> wrote:
>
> >There are other related tables like log here, where I'm really not
> >interested in historical data but just the identity of the user, and
> >those where exact user properties in point of time matter.
> >
> >The one-field user table smells like a design problem.
>
> Smells like a domain.
>
> At the conceptual level, every domain is just a column (or several
> columns) of values. Think of it as a domain of user ID numbers. (And
> call it "user_id" if you can.)

But it isn't a domain: the domain of user ID numbers would be something like "any 6 digit number between 100000 and 999999" or "a string of between 3 and 30 letters and numbers"; whereas this table represents the list of users who actually exist, and the user_id column is in the domain of user IDs. Received on Sun Jan 25 2004 - 12:39:33 CET