Sometimes it''s a matter of taste or design constraint, but why not use a small join table and a foreign key? ENUM is also a great choice, as these guys have pointed out, but sometimes there is a bit of overhead -- but you shouldn't worry about that until it becomes an issue. Personally, I find it easier to maintain a simple join table and FK relationships than to mess with ENUM field types.
I don't know if this is still applicable, but it seems like there is a bit of data massaging in Rails for the ENUM type (Rails converts it internally to VARCHAR): http://lists.rubyonrails.org/pipermail/rails/2005-January/001536.html I like to let the database do as much work as it can, :-) HTH! Billee D. On May 7, 4:43 am, Vipin <[email protected]> wrote: > in a database table if there is a field which has a certain set of > fixed values. for example > staus => {Single, Married, Divorced } > OR > state => {California, Albama, Olaska ...} > > so what should be preferred way out of the following for storing the > values > > 1. Keep the field as "string(Rails)" VARCHAR(MySQL) itself ....and > while showing the field just show the field value. > > 2. Keep the field internally as a code like {:california => > 01, :albama => 02, washington => 03 ....} but while showing the state > show only the corresponding state. > > By using option 2, a certain disadvantage is extra computation time > required to find out corresponding state name based on code when > showing the state field to user. But an advantage could be in terms of > smaller database. In my opinion, saving 01 as an integer could save > significant space than storing "california" if number of records > happen to be in tens of thousands . > > please suggest ?? > > vipin --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Ruby on Rails: Talk" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/rubyonrails-talk?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
