Re: joins: avoiding recurrences

From: Daniel Morgan <damorgan_at_x.washington.edu>
Date: Mon, 23 Feb 2004 17:29:14 -0800
Message-ID: <1077586114.575260@yasure>

Torsten wrote:

> Hello Daniel Morgan,
>
> I have a very temporary limited job, providing a web interface to a
> limited selection of tables (only) to our spreaded working group.
>
> If you write me, that (natural joins)
>

>>They are the invention of a marketing department and have no place in
>>any serious application.

>
> I couldn't win anything from that. I know how they work, I can see the
> results... Shall I better use <table join table using(column)>? I know
> the data well
> Torsten

No doubt. But the person who comes after you to maintain it may not. The other problem with natural joins is that the code does not document what has been joined. There is no way to explicitly know whether data integrity has been maintained.

For the few extra characters it takes to type is correctly I urge you to not (never) use natural joins. There are many things Oracle does for marketing purposes that are just plain bad practice. Among them the roles CONNECT, RESOURCE and DBA. Just because it exists is not a good reason to use it.

-- 
Daniel Morgan
http://www.outreach.washington.edu/ext/certificates/oad/oad_crs.asp
http://www.outreach.washington.edu/ext/certificates/aoa/aoa_crs.asp
damorgan_at_x.washington.edu
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Received on Mon Feb 23 2004 - 19:29:14 CST