>Hi Curtis,
>
>>Where the heck are you? Somewhere out in the Pacific no doubt. I've never heard of CNMI. What does it stand for?
>
>Commonwealth of the Northern Marianas Islands...this group of islands (Saipan, Tinian - where, incidently, the Enola Gay took off from - and Rota) were part of the Trust Territory after WWII...now mostly an Asian tourist destination (for golf, blue lagoons, beaches, shopping), and there are a number of ...ummm.... garment factories employing a huge number of foreign workers.
>
>M P is the US postal designation = Marianas Pacific.

Cool! Sounds like a nice place to live and work. Plus I'll bet you've cornered the market on FoxPro development on the island. < g >

>
>
>>In answer to your question - it depends. There are lots of factors on whether to normalize your data or not. I would say that the chief reasons for de-normalizing would be speed and convenience.
>
>I don't get why this is related to "normalization?" I'm wondering about the difference between computing or storing things like the accrued interest, running balance, etc. maybe I misunderstand Normalization - or is it because some values depend on previous records?

Yeah something like that. Complete normalization (IMO) is nice in theory, but not at all practical. You can begin splitting hairs too finely with ease.

>
>
>>You don't think that you'll see a huge increase in data any time soon, so, if you think that the addition of the items you're looking to add will cause users a problem, then I would stick with calculating on the fly. That's always less of a headache than storing a calculated result.
>
>Yes, originally (before understatnding views), i had problems dealing with what to do if a value in the middle of the list of transactions was changed or added or removed...had to recompute the whole darn thing, along w/reading and writing all those intervening records - messy! With updateable views, this seems more straightforward.
>
>
>>So - have I completely confrused you?
>no! thanks for your input. it's appreciated.
>
>Regards, J

So that's it! We're done. That was easy. Especially since I basically disagreed with Barbara Paltiel. It all depends upon which method you like better.