Alan,

> I might jump in here...
> I do not use foreign keys at all in my databases!
> ooooh I hear frowns and tisk tisks here....

You should have seen my face now - lots of frowns :)

It's logically incorrect NOT to use foreign keys (or other measures of
integrity) - this is what your DBMS is designed to do.

So if it gives poor performance when you are doing this, it's because of
implementation errors (or at least, not the best implementation possible).

Hence, I would rather have someone taking a stand here and sponsor
(money!!) the Firebird project to think of ways to do a better
implementation for FK-related issues with poor selectivity. This way,
one could still use FKs AND have decent performance.

Triggers for integrity ... ouch.


Just my 2 c...

Martijn Tonies
InterBase Workbench - the developer tool for InterBase and Firebird
http://www.interbaseworkbench.com

Upscene Productions
http://www.upscene.com

"This is an object-oriented system.
If we change anything, the users object."