On 4/19/07, Jim Davis <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > Any thoughts? Comments? Resources you'd like to share? Have I even made > myself clear?
Our mainframe application goes a step in that direction. Where many applications might have "STATES" and "COUNTRIES" tables... We have what is called a TMO table For the vast majority of thes codes.. it's simple. TABLID, TABLKEY, FLDSEQ, TABLFLD 006,AL,1,Alabama 006,AK,1,Alaska 006,AS,1,American Samoa etc... But what the heck is that FLDSEQ for? Attributes... we don't use it on the states table.. but we do maintain another table that contains user information TABLID, TABLKEY, FLDSEQ, TABLFLD 940,RICKROOT,1,Rick Root 940,RICKROOT,2,[EMAIL PROTECTED] 940,RICKROOT,3,Alumni and Development Systems 940,RICKROOT,4,1-800-555-1212 etc... What it means is that we can add an attribute without having to modify any tables... Of course, if you want to retrieve data on users, that means you have to do a whole bunch of joins for every field. =) We of course made a view to simplify that stuff. it's functional, but I don't particularly care for it. I'd rather join to the USERS table, or the STATES table, or the COUNTRIES table. I think you complicate the database fairly dramatically by doing that kind of thing on a large scale basis, and I'm not sure it's worth it. Rick ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Create robust enterprise, web RIAs. Upgrade & integrate Adobe Coldfusion MX7 with Flex 2 http://www.adobe.com/products/coldfusion/flex2/?sdid=RVJP Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Talk/message.cfm/messageid:275847 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Talk/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=11502.10531.4
