Robert Crowell wrote:
However, if the table was created with columns A, B, C, and D, most of the entries in the D column will be NULL. Is this considered 'good form'? Even though these entries are all NULL, they will still consume the disk space that a DOUBLE will, correct?
I can't find it in the documentation now, but last I remember in MyISAM dynamic tables (which is what you'd have, assuming you're using VARCHARs) each record has a bit for each nullable column that indicates whether it's NULL or not (just as it has a bit indicating whether each column is 0 -- or the equivalent -- or not). So no, those NULL entries don't take any extra space.
-- Keith Ivey <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Smokefree DC http://www.smokefreedc.org Washington, DC -- MySQL General Mailing List For list archives: http://lists.mysql.com/mysql To unsubscribe: http://lists.mysql.com/[EMAIL PROTECTED]
