>A total lack of vision??? You seem to be the one making the assumption that all applications must handle address data from foreign country. Some applications by their nature can only be used in the locale it was written for because the context is not, has not, and very likely will never exist for any other locale. Preparing for all possibilities is nice but it is certainly not always practical.

That's what I'm talking about. For what you said, I think you would never sold to a foreign customer, never buy from a foreign vendor, and maybe never had the ooportunity to write an application outside of Richmond, Virginia, perhaps (of course this is an exaggeration, please don't take it seriously).

I think this is lack of vision, and excuse me if it sounds offensive, but that's not what I intend. Walter argued many times that his strategy is oriented to keep flexibility, and I think that surrogates are great at that and intellignet key not, for that trans-regional issues, in part.

As I see it, the case for foreign data anticipation (note that what is foreign for you is local for me, and that we're talking every day, always, so borders are not what it used to be), is easily expandable to a lot of other situation of sudden specification changes.

>By the way, I generally agree with Walter on the natural key issue except that I don’t use composite keys for my own personal reasons. I have been doing this stuff for over 10 years and none of the natural key selections I have made have have suffered any data change...

You're lucky. I have way over 10 years also in this business and I've started using intelligent keys only, and composites also. I actually had a lot of problems with both that could have being avoided with surrogates. Many years ago we agreed internally that it was best to use surrogates EVER. We have improved a lot since then, and in many situations we are glad we decided to do so.

So, my last words on that issue is: It has worked for me. I haven't saw a single case that really overturn my idea, and many smart people I know agree and gave me even better arguments. A few smart people as you and Walter gave me other points of view but I'm not convinced.

What do I have when someone ask me for help about this topic?