Wednesday, August 29, 2018

DISTINCT and ORDER BY Are Not Relational

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“One of the things that confuse SQL users all the time is how DISTINCT and ORDER BY are related in a SQL query ... most people quickly und...
Wednesday, August 15, 2018

Order Is For Society, Not Databases

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8/18/18: I have re-written this post for a better explanation. If you read it prior to the revision, you should re-read it.   “I learned...
Sunday, August 5, 2018

No Such Thing As "Primary Key Tuning"

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“The choice of good InnoDB primary keys is a critical performance tuning decision. This post will guide you through the steps of choosing ...
Monday, July 30, 2018

Lenin, Trotsky, Data Management, and the Tyranny of Knowledge and Reason -- Version 2

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14 years ago I published an editorial with this title in response to a Slashdot.com exchange triggered by one of my articles at DBAzine.com...
Monday, July 23, 2018

Industry Practice Is No Substitute for Foundation Knowledge

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“A short time ago a colleague asked me where he could find a "Databases 101" guide for the non-technical professional. As it tur...
Sunday, July 15, 2018

Understanding Relations Part 3: Debunking Conventional Wisdom

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(See Part 1 and Part 2 ) “A common term used in database design is a "relational database" -- but a database relation is not ...
Wednesday, July 4, 2018

N-ary vs. Binary Relations: Anatomy of a Compound Misconception

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Note: This is a re-write of an older post, to bring it into line with the McGoveran formalization and interpretation [ 1 ] of Codd's t...