I cannot see the future as well as you, Mike. But my more recent designs do not have any columns with the letters p-h-o-n-e in a column name. There is a column for ContactType, and another for ContactValue. I could someday add a new contact type of ipv6, in addition to existing types of email, mobile, work, google voice, twitterID, etc. No schema change needed.
Bill On Feb 22, 2012 5:46 PM, "Mike Byerley" <[email protected]> wrote: > I started using nnn.nnn.nnnn for phone numbers anticipating at some time > sub > ipv6, phones will just be IP numbers. Just a guess though. > > > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Bill Downall" <[email protected]> > To: "RBASE-L Mailing List" <[email protected]> > Sent: Wednesday, February 22, 2012 11:26 AM > Subject: [RBASE-L] - RE: Too relational? > > > It's nice to see Professor Wills here! You know a topic like this would get > him going. > > Bill, in my mind, a basic reason to normalize fully is to create a database > that is least likely to need either schema changes or awkward > exception-handling down the road. > > If you do not normalize, and you provide room for 3 phone numbers, some day > you will have to put the fourth phone number in the comments, or change the > schema to allow for 4 phone numbers. > > Schema changes are expensive, because all forms and reports and procedures > and eeps and views and rules and triggers and applications that relate to > that data may have to be changed, too, and cannot be done by users through > "settings", but have to be done by programmers. > > Putting the data in the "wrong" place like the comments means people won't > find that data with a normal search or query. > > There are other good reasons to normalize, like not "wasting" columns that > are usually blank, and not having to search three or five columns instead > of one (For example, to determine what customer might have sent us an > incomplete or garbled fax message or credit card transaction where all we > know is that their address is "345 Main Street"). But avoiding future > expensive schema changes is the main one. > > Bill > > > On Wed, Feb 22, 2012 at 11:02 AM, Wills, Steve <[email protected]> wrote: > > > “Too relational” is a state that is rarely achieved, IMHO. I think your > > issue/question often and I like the direction of your thinking. I guess > > that thinking about such makes me a little “twisted” to some. I also own > > my own barcode-scanner - well enough about my predilections!**** > > > > > > >
