Re: Plural or singular table names

"Ray Cassick \(home\)" <raycassNOSPAM_at_adelphia.net> wrote in message news:<4qf4b.11737$Nc.6608551_at_news1.news.adelphia.net>...
> "Should table names be in the plural or singular forms?"
>

I seem to remember a recent post on another thread in this group from Joe Celko that discussed table & column names (amongst other things) - don't have the link to hand, but it was a discussion about table design.

I would tend to the singular though, as reading the relation as a predicate makes more sense to me that way (e.g. for a relation of candidates with attributes scn, forename and surname the relation could be read as "there is a candidate with candidate number scn, whose first name is forename and whose family name is surname"). With a plural, it would have to read as something like "there is a set of candidates each of whom has ..." which is a bit more long winded. (The other plural reading, "there are candidates with..." makes no sense for a relation.)

Utterly informal, like all rules of thumb, prejudices, etc. etc. ! :)

• Tony