Re: How to model searchable properties of an entity

I've done something like this a couple of years ago. What I ended up doing was creating tables for meta-data, somewhat like Todd is suggesting, but more elaborate. This came rather naturally as we were trying to implement a product hierarchy in which a certain product class had certain properties and specific products could have seperate properties.

This would allow you to add a part as an instance of a pre-defined part- class and add your own attributes to it as well. I must agree that this is an OO way of thinking translated to relational, but it's not mutually exclusive.

Dilip Angal wrote:

> I still don't know how to convince you guys.
> You are all pointing to the process issues that users may give
> different spellings for color.
> I can handle that part by having an admin to create the properties who
> makes sure that the property being added to the part is really
> required and is not used in past by any one in any different context.
>
> But the basic fact does not change.
> I need to keep adding these properties from time to time because user
> communitiy can not decide all of them upfront.
>
> Also, I may have 500 such properties and I can have up to 1M different
> part numnbers. This will give you some idea of complexity.
> User may choose, show me all the parts with width 10 inches, and price
> less than $10 and .... can go on for ever. I need to come back in
> resonable time (Reasonable can be couple of seconds)
>
> Also note that the Search engine techniques used by EBya like company
> works only if these attributes are no updated. If they are ever
> updated, Search engines like inverted index fails miserably.
>
> So, please try to understand my problme and accept it as it is and if
> you have solution to solve it, please let me know.
> Dilip
Received on Mon Aug 16 2004 - 11:37:10 CEST