>>>Hi,
>>>
>>>The main table of my app has about 70 fields (column in SQL Server). And I need to add 6 more fields. This table, for the largest customers is about 700,000 records/rows (in SQL Server) and will probably be 1,000,000 soon.
>>>In your experience is this number of fields (about 80) too many for the table of this size? I just want to know if I am not "breaking" a good practice.
>>>
>>>TIA for you input.
>>
>>No problem, you are far from the maximum number of fields. However, if the extra fields will only rarely contain data, I would probably create a separate table. Difficult to say without more details.
>
>First, thank you. What is the maximum number of fields?
>As to creating a separate table, I thought about it. But, as far as design, it will be more overhead (design) and time to implement and maintain. So, for simplicity - as long as I am not breaking SQL Server or VFP, putting these fields in the same table would work better.
If changing the data structure is a task you expect to happen from time to time, and it takes a lot of time to implement and maintain, you may need to rethink your data layer. Adding a child table with a foreign key should be a standard task that is managed by a good data layer that does all the work for you.
Time is too precious to waste on recurring and tedious tasks.
Christian Isberner
Software Consultant