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Re: Attribute-values in separate table

From: -CELKO- <jcelko212_at_earthlink.net>
Date: Sun, 28 Oct 2007 10:57:26 -0700
Message-ID: <1193594246.936744.176310_at_19g2000hsx.googlegroups.com> 






>> It is a truly poor programmer indeed who would trade off data integrity for a faulty expectation of reduced work.  If there are eighty types of atomic facts, then whether you're coding for one table or for eighty, you still have to code for eighty types of atomic facts.  Is it really less work to lump it all together? <<





It is much worse than that.  Try to write a multi-purpose DEFAULT
clause for all the attributes of those 80 different facts.  Try to
write a single CHECK() constraint for all the attributes of those 80
different facts.



The first one is impossible in SQL.  The CHECK() constraint is
possible but awful.  I actually tried it for demo purposes.  You start
with a CASE expression for all of the possible domains in the little
sample schema .. and hope that you never have more than five
attributes.
Received on Sun Oct 28 2007 - 18:57:26 CET












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