Ann W. Harrison wrote:

> Alan McDonald wrote:
>>One contact table with 3 FKs into
>>the three master tables. For each relation, the other two FKs remain null
>>while the one FK is the key to the relation in question.
>>Now this obviously leads to high dups on the FK index.
>
> I'm probably confused by your use of "relation" - which to me equates to
> table, and seems to mean something else you.

I've never been able to understand why "relation" is supposed to be a
synonym to "table" in relational DB lingo. To me it seems so obvious
that the "relational aspect" of relational databases is their ability to
relate *tables* with each other. So, the "relation" is not the table
itself - it's something "between" two tables (or a table and itself).
The relation is usually implemented as on or a set of columns in a
table, or in the M-M case as a separate table, but that's beside the point.

Feel free to explain to me why "relation" is used like this in
relational DB lingo.

Also feel free to kick my butt for bringing this up, since it might very
well be considered off topic.

Kjell
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Kjell Rilbe
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