Michael Stevens <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> On Tue, Jul 16, 2002 at 10:47:23AM +0100, Roger Burton West wrote:
> > On or about Tue, Jul 16, 2002 at 10:43:17AM +0100, Peter Haworth typed:
> > >Surely you shouldn't rely on sequences being contiguous, anyway? Who cares
> > >if your test eats up some values; their only purpose should be to ensure
> > >uniqueness.
> > Contiguity becomes important when you're doing things like generating
> > invoice numbers.
>
> I've forgotten the precise details, but I remember doing at least
> one system which assigned random but unique ids to everything.
> I think these happened to be given to the client in some situation.
> He was very unhappy and insisted we use 'proper' ids. If anyone's
> going to see an id, it usually seems to work out better if it's an
> integer that goes up by 1 every time an id is generated.
Depends on the thing being IDed in question. If it's anything that
might be sucsceptible to 'session stealing' type events, then having
an id that is completely opaque is generally a good idea.
--
Piers
"It is a truth universally acknowledged that a language in
possession of a rich syntax must be in need of a rewrite."
-- Jane Austen?
