Re: A Normalization Question

"Neo" <neo55592_at_hotmail.com> wrote in message news:4b45d3ad.0407081107.700a9113_at_posting.google.com...
> > You have failed to show that they represent the *same* fact.
>
> You have *failed* to define what is a fact?
>
> However, regardless of whether the string 'brown' is categorized as a
> fact or not by your definition, they still represent the same thing,
> the string 'brown'. Having three things that represent the same thing
> in one db is redundant.\

It's physically redundant, not logically redundant. It has nothing to do with normalization of a data model, which is a logical model. There is nothing wrong with physical redundancy, as it speeds things up tremendously. It is the old tradeoff of space vs. speed. Space is cheap, time is not.

 While the role that each string 'brown' plays
> is different (first unsystematically refers a person, second to a
> color, third to a street) the three strings themselves represent the
> same thing, the string 'brown'. This is redundant. A thing and the
> string which names it are two separate things. Below is approximately
> how XDb1 normalizes the three strings.
>
> Thing Person Color Street
> 1 ->2 ->3 ->4
>
> Person Name
> 2 ->5
>
> Color Name
> 3 ->5
>
> Street Name
> 4 ->5
>
> String Sym1 Sym2 Sym3 Sym4 Sym5 ....
> 5 ->6, ->7, ->8, ->9, ->10
>
> Symbol
> 6 b
> 7 r
> 8 o
> 9 w
> 10 n
>
> Note, there are no tables in XDb1, only things. However certain groups
> of things can be considered a list, tree, table, matrix, etc.
Received on Fri Jul 09 2004 - 00:25:00 CEST