Mark,

LOL, yeah, I read your message. It perfectly shows the problem with normalization. To be honest, I don't use the normalization theory anymore; after designing numerous databases, designing a well balanced database becomes a second nature.


Walter,


>I posted this earlier in the thread to add a bit of fun.

>No you can never over normalize.

>When reviewing one of my apps I noticed that the letter A had been used in my tables time and time again.

>Looking further I noticed that all the other letters of the alphabet were also represented in this wasteful way,
>
>To solve this problem I created a table with 26 records in it each representing the letters of the alphabet and had each letter looked up as it was used.
>
>I then realised that these letters could be upper or lower case so altered this to 52 records.
>
>I then hit upon the problem of punctuation characters....very wasteful and they can be used several thousand times in a big table.
>
>To cut a long story short I have now managed to to fully normalize my application.
>
>We have now had to upgrade to a Cray super computer to get the performance that we need from the app but I feel that is a small price to pay for doing things in a correct manner.
>
>I.Pedant@Microsoft.com
>
>
>(The above is not a true case study and should be reviewed with appropriate levity) <g>