[TriLUG] OT: Opinion Poll: Database design

Brian Henning brian at strutmasters.com
Tue Jul 20 09:57:38 EDT 2004


Howdy Folks,
  Just wondering what people's opinions are on the following topic:
a) One table with copious fields
-vs-
b) Multiple tables with fewer fields each, linked somehow
ex:
a) One table with 30 fields containing all possible customer data (name, 2
addresses, 4 phone numbers, e-mail, payment method, etc)
-vs-
b) One table with names and IDs (2 or 3 fields), one table with addresses
(11 fields), one table with contact info (6 fields), one table with payment
data (4 or 5 fields).

Note that this is intentionally an example where there is no need for
many-to-one mapping, with the exception of two addresses (billing and
shipping) to one customer, so the many-to-one ease facilitated by option (b)
isn't much of an incentive in this case.

This is entirely academic, as I've already made my decision for the database
in question..  I'm just curious what others think, especially if any
opinions happen to address performance vs. storage space -type issues.

Cheers,
~Brian
----------------
Brian A. Henning
Strutmasters.com
866.597.2397
----------------





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