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Normalization? What must I do?

Posted: Thu Jan 24, 2008 7:54 am
by Sindarin
Since I've gotten into mySQL, some people told me that I should read about normalization, in order to avoid future maintenance errors in the database. The problem is I don't clearly understand what exactly I should do on my end to ensure the integrity of my database? Add multiple checks in submission forms before data gets into the database? Organise the data in many separate tables? Install maintenance software?

Re: Normalization? What must I do?

Posted: Thu Jan 24, 2008 7:55 am
by VladSun

Re: Normalization? What must I do?

Posted: Thu Jan 24, 2008 9:03 pm
by bdlang
There's also a good article on MySQL's site:
http://dev.mysql.com/tech-resources/articles/intro-to-normalization.html


To answer your questions in a nutshell: yes (but this has nothing to do with normalization), probably, not necessary.

Re: Normalization? What must I do?

Posted: Thu Jan 24, 2008 9:19 pm
by califdon
Normalization has nothing whatsoever to do with the data that is entered, it is concerned with what fields are created in a table, which is a one-time job (but very important). You seem to be describing data validation.

Anyway, the clearest article I've read on normalization is at http://www.phlonx.com/resources/nf3/.

Re: Normalization? What must I do?

Posted: Thu Jan 24, 2008 10:23 pm
by Chris Corbyn
califdon wrote:Normalization has nothing whatsoever to do with the data that is entered, it is concerned with what fields are created in a table, which is a one-time job (but very important). You seem to be describing data validation.

Anyway, the clearest article I've read on normalization is at http://www.phlonx.com/resources/nf3/.
That is a good article :) You may wish to post in our Useful Resources sticky at the top of this Databases board ;)