Re: Database design

"Alexandr Savinov" <spam_at_conceptoriented.com> wrote in message news:43fc6eec$1_at_news.fhg.de...
> x schrieb:

> > Do you know about any published academic paper about relational
databases in
> > which the term flat is defined ?
> > Why is it useful to define this term from a scientific point of view ?
>
> There is several reasons why it is useful:

> 1. It allows us to get an informal impression and what is the essence,
> what we are talking about. An informal characterization (an idea) is the
> primary thing while formalities is the secondary thing (a tool which
> makes it easier to derive consequences).

Ok.

> 2. Just because we use other informal terms in order to describe a
> theory or approach. Eventually, in any academic paper and in this group
> most of words have no formal definition. And this does not prevent us to
> comprehend them. And again: writing formulas does not add a value to any
> theory - it is only a form which may make it easer or more difficult to
> understand.

You mentioned other "exotic" terms from science (Fuzziness and roughness of sets, charmness of quarks )
Fuzziness of sets has a precise definition.

> 3. This group is intended to discuss what is not covered by academic
> papers so there is nothing bad that we can introduce something unusual.

I don't know for what is intended.

> Anyway, I do not understand why a structure without an order (hierarchy,
> multiple levels, depth etc.) cannot be characterized as flat? It is
> rather precise characterization (in contrast to many terms from academic
> papers which are frequently simply misleading).

third level - the relation
second level - the tuple
first level - the value
And each value belong to a domain also.

How flat is this. Received on Wed Feb 22 2006 - 15:35:08 CET