> Hi all,
>
> I've got a Firebird database design that we've used for a few years.
> It essentially holds large e-mail archives on a per-user basis.
> Currently we have a single table that stores each message in a row, and
> a field identifies the user. Most of the fields are indexed too.
>
> The problem is that queries quickly become very slow as the data volume
> increases. It seems to me that it would make more sense to have a
> single table per user because there are no queries that span multiple
> users.
>
> Does it make sense to do this if it results in several thousand tables
> or are there disadvantages in having many tables? I know that it is
> bad database design, but is there a practical reason in this case to
> uses a single table?
>
> Thanks for your advice,
> - Elric

I see no reason to maintain thousands of tables. Query peformance might
depend on your queries and the indexes you have so you'd best show some more
info on this subject.
Alan