Large tables and Primary keys

Can anyone put me on the right track, please ?

We have three Alphas running VMS 7.1 and ORACLE 7.3.2 The system produces data locally as a result of recruitment operations (Home
Shopping Catalog) and this is then transfered (near real time) to another
Alpha for later use.
This data is to be stored for upto two years. As part of the process a key is produced (enquiry_no) using a cyclic sequence,
a company no.(1-8) and a nine digit sequential sequence number

ie for company 4 on machine no. 2

if the Alpha No. 2 sequence was 74

Algorithm would use 744000000001 to produced a mod31 key of W19GEED1

Alpha No. 1 - Sequences 63-69
Alpha No. 2 - Sequences 70-76
Alpha No. 3 - Sequences 77-83

So Key ranges per machine would be 1. PXZFLJ9P - TDKMW3NR
                                   2. TFVHGG4V - WYFPR1HW
                                   3. X0PKCDZZ - ZGBSKZD0

My problems is I don't know how indexes are built (internally) and so have
no idea how find the correct value for PCTFREE when creating the Primary keys
on the tables.
Since the keys, when generated, will be in groups (as above) and will always
be sequential do I have a problem with splitting index blocks if I get the
PCTFREE wrong or could I just make it ZERO ? We will be, at some time, dumping the data to flat files then housekeeping /
deleting the data (will this cause a problem with index space) ?

Please put me straight, I'm totally confused.

Thanks

Ian (U.K)

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to return e-mail remove nospam from address...... Received on Sat Jan 09 1999 - 08:55:53 CST