Re: Foreign key in Oracle Sql

On Fri, 21 Jan 2005 10:25:51 GMT, "David Cressey" <david.cressey_at_earthlink.net> wrote:

>"TML" <joeysmith_at_gmail.com> wrote in message
>news:1106275090.342389.314890_at_f14g2000cwb.googlegroups.com...
>
>> I'd like to hear more about this. Why not? Why *couldn't* Oracle
>> implement a runtime compatibility setting for this? Is there an actual
>> TECHNICAL reason, or simply the obvious (and already discussed) slew of
>> business reasons?
>
>I'd like to respond to your request for TECHNICAL reasons, without wasting
>too much time on the fray part of it.

[snip]

>Now, how about fixed length character strings? Simple. Just fill the whole
>field (oooops I meant attribute... ignore that man behind the curtain!)
>with zero bytes. A zero byte is the Ascii Null character anyway, so this

     No, it is not. The name of ASCII code 0 is "NUL". This is not the same as "NULL".

>might as well be the SQL NULL form. This sounds like it wastes a lot of
>space, but Oracle has other neat tricks it does to deal with that.

     Unless someone wants to store your sentinel value.

     I do not use NULLs, but using Oracle, I would be forced to deal with them.

[snip]

Sincerely,

Gene Wirchenko Received on Mon Jan 24 2005 - 22:33:35 CET