Re: Who first (publicly) asserted 3NF is "good enough"?

"Roy Hann" <specially_at_processed.almost.meat> wrote in message news:fpednXTGmYHjIJPYRVnyiA_at_pipex.net...
> "Bob Badour" <bbadour_at_pei.sympatico.ca> wrote in message
> news:KZwPg.22209$9u.263092_at_ursa-nb00s0.nbnet.nb.ca...
> >> It's probably far too late to get a confident answer now, but does
anyone
> >> know if there was a single authoritative writer (long ago) who
expressed
> >> this foolish idea?
> >
> > It's not so much that 3nf is good enough as it is that almost all 3nf
> > designs are also in 5nf.
>
> Indeed. That is almost verbatim what I tell people too.
>
> I wanted to know if there was some specific culprit I could name and
shame.
> I am happy enough to laboriously work through the whys and wherefores if
> challenged, but in in the interests of brevity in a presentation I'm doing
> on Wednesday I want to just slander someone and move on.
>
> Roy
>
>

I think I know the name of the person that first gave me the idea that 3NF is "good enough". It's Jeff Tash.

Back in 1983-1984 when I was first learning relational database, I was an employee at Digital, and so was Jeff.
Jeff was teaching an internal 3 day seminar on Rdb and DSRI at that time, and I'm pretty sure it was him.

So, if you need someone to blame, he's my nominee.

But what Bob said is true. 3NF is 5NF except for complex cases. Received on Mon Sep 18 2006 - 22:16:53 CEST