Officelink wrote: > Hi everyone, > > I¹m trying to set up a database with information that will be used in a > garment slideshow in flash. > > The information to be included as part of the slideshow would be: > code, optional title, description, colours, sizes, garment image, fabric > swatch image > > Each clothing item to be included in the slideshow will belong to one of > eleven or so categories. Each of the categories will belong to one of two > category types. > > I also planned to set up a simple CMS that would allow the information to be > added, edited and deleted from the database. > > With the above goals in mind, I came up with two tables as follows: > > GARMENTS TABLE > garment_id, int(11), not null, auto_increment, primary key > cat_id, int(10), unsigned, not null, default 0 > garment_code, varchar(30), not null > garment_title, varchar(40), null > garment_desc, varchar(255), not null > garment_image, varchar(50), not null > garment_colour, varchar(50), not null > garment_swatch, varchar(50), null > garment_sizes, varchar(100), not null > > CATEGORIES TABLE > cat_id, int(10), not null, auto_increment, primary key > cat_name, varchar(40), not null > cat_type, tinyint(4), not null, default 1 > > I was worried about repeating data in some of the columns, for example the > garment_desc column would have information about sleeve length, cuff type, > fabric, fabric composition etc. and I thought that all these areas could > possibly be broken up into separate tables, but I wasn¹t sure if it was > necessary. Also the colour and size columns would have a lot of repetitive > data. >
While normalization does have the goal of eliminating repetition, there are other reasons. Most notably, you don't want to introduce errors or even differences into your database. A person who accidentally types "eRd", for instance. You might, and I emphasize the word "might", consider breaking color and size into two different tables based upon the following: 1. The possible set of "valid" answers. 2. Whether that element will be used in any sort of grouping or searching level (are you able to search by color, for instance) -- The NCP Revue -- http://www.ncprevue.com/blog -- MySQL General Mailing List For list archives: http://lists.mysql.com/mysql To unsubscribe: http://lists.mysql.com/[EMAIL PROTECTED]
