Generally speaking, this is not a good database design. It's tempting
because of the myriad of string functions in Cold Fusion that make
manipulating strings like this fairly easy. But from a pure database
standpoint, storing multiple information like this in one field is frowned
upon.
I think Pete's suggestions are worth looking into....good design up front
facilitates the inevitable changes and enhancements down the road.
Brian
----- Original Message -----
From: "Pooh Bear" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "CF-Talk" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Monday, May 21, 2001 1:12 PM
Subject: RE: Database Design Question
> Oh, you see, this project does not display the choices for the question,
nor
> does it displays the question. And there's only 1 answer for each
question.
> so I think 2 tables is the best way to handle it. but I might consider
> putting the answers in one row for each exam like ABBCCCBBDDEEBDD, then
just
> use some string functions on them!
>
>
> >From: "Pete Freitag" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> >Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> >To: CF-Talk <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> >Subject: RE: Database Design Question
> >Date: Mon, 21 May 2001 13:10:13 -0400
> >
> >Your DB can "probably" handle that many rows as long as its properly
> >indexed, but you should look at some database normalization techniques.
A
> >fully normalized design might have a table for...
> >
> >exams
> >questions
> >choices
> >
> >the correct answer should be a foreign key in questions table to the
> >choices
> >table.
> >
> >A good way to approach database design is to extract all nouns and make
> >them
> >entities. Then determine the relationships between the entities (one to
> >many, many to many, or one to one).
> >
> >
> >Pete Freitag ([EMAIL PROTECTED])
> >CFDEV.COM
> >ColdFusion Developers Resources
> >http://www.cfdev.com/
> >
> >
> >-----Original Message-----
> >From: Pooh Bear [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
> >Sent: Monday, May 21, 2001 12:15 PM
> >To: CF-Talk
> >Subject: Database Design Question
> >
> >
> >hey yall, I'm workin on this project where you can get answers to a
certain
> >exam (like if you're a teacher or instructor, u can use it to show to
your
> >students). All of the answers are multiple choices. Each exam has
> >anywhere
> >between 25 and 70 questions. I want to know the best way to store the
> >answers. Currently I am approaching it with 2 tables. The first table
has
> >info about the exam (name, date, subject, etc) the second table contains
> >the answers, and has the ExamID next to it (one row equals one answer).
I
> >was thinking that by doing that, I will get too many rows. like what if
> >there are 500 exams. 25 times 500 is a lot of rows! i am concerned
about
> >the speed. Is there a way to store the answers? or is the DB good
enough
> >to handle that much stuff? i'm using SQL server 7.0, the box has 512mb
and
> >900mhz processor (it's a dev box also). thank you! :)
> >
>
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