Path: newssvr20.news.prodigy.com!newsmst01a.news.prodigy.com!prodigy.com!news.glorb.com!news.moat.net!border1.nntp.sjc.giganews.com!nntp.giganews.com!local1.nntp.sjc.giganews.com!nntp.comcast.com!news.comcast.com.POSTED!not-for-mail NNTP-Posting-Date: Sat, 24 Apr 2004 16:38:17 -0500 Reply-To: "Laconic2" From: "Laconic2" Newsgroups: comp.databases.theory References: <408a2873$0$563$e4fe514c@news.xs4all.nl> Subject: Re: c.d.theory glossary - NULL Date: Sat, 24 Apr 2004 17:39:10 -0400 X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 6.00.2800.1409 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V6.00.2800.1409 Message-ID: Lines: 19 NNTP-Posting-Host: 24.60.68.134 X-Trace: sv3-ZHHrLbmOXSzi6S5MP3qp6yZB+njLVKpwS34eTC1fMqW5d0ahSYtAqKmpO1oj6CYjCKSqXSQSPF3S6av!jEVPIpao8r/i7KaMgyspW4LG8PQYLPwcDACz23oPAac64VOQ2UGbrXWqagkH X-Complaints-To: abuse@comcast.net X-DMCA-Complaints-To: dmca@comcast.net X-Abuse-and-DMCA-Info: Please be sure to forward a copy of ALL headers X-Abuse-and-DMCA-Info: Otherwise we will be unable to process your complaint properly X-Postfilter: 1.1 Xref: newssvr20.news.prodigy.com comp.databases.theory:25926 > You can do that much better with special values. Except that special values aren't values. They all offer different reasons why there is no value here, but they all deny the existence of a value. > > Some cells should have default values, but some should not. > > That's orthogonal. No, it's not. That seems to be the standard way to win an argument around here. Declare the other person's comment orthogonal. When a row is inserted, and there are no values supplied for one of the columns, one of three things can happen: the insert can fail; the inser can proceed, with a default value plugged in for the missing value, or a NULL can be placed in the location.