I have a table with one column source_id whose value should be the primary key of another table, though which table it is will vary from record to record. Every record must have a value for source_table that specifies the table for the source record, and a value for source_id that specifies the row in the source table.
Is there any way to accomplish this to take advantage of the DB's foreign key constraints and validation? Or will I have to move my validation logic into the application layer? Alternately, is there another design that will just let me avoid this problem?
Foreign key constraints can only reference one target table. "Conditional" foreign keys which reference a different target table based on some other field are not available in SQL. As #OMG Ponies noted in a comment below, you can have more than one foreign key on the same column, referencing more than one table, but that would mean the value of that column will have to exist in all the referenced tables. I guess this is not what you are after.
For a few possible solutions, I suggest checking out #Bill Karwin's answer to this question:
Possible to do a MySQL foreign key to one of two possible tables?
I like the "supertable" approach in general. You may also want to check out this post for another example:
MySQL - Conditional Foreign Key Constraints
I think previous answers do answer the first part of the question well. However link recommended by Daniel provides a solution only for the case when the number of referenced "source" tables is reasonably small. And the solution will not scale easily if you decide to increase the number of "source" tables.
To recommend a better strategy it would be nice to have a little more details on what the task is and if the "source" tables have anything in common that would allow to combine them.
In current structure (as far as I can infer from the question) I would reverse the relationship:
I would create a table (let's call it AllSources) that would work as a repository of all available sources with columns source_id and source_table. Both included in the primary key.
I would create foreign keys from each "source" table referencing AllSources table so that they could have only sources already registered in it.
Then I would create the table you mentioned in your question with foreign key referencing the AllSources table (not separate "source" tables).
Drawback: you will have to manage AllSources and "source" tables together ensuring that if you create a record in AllSources, you also create a corresponding record in proper "source" table, which in reality is not that hard.
Related
I have the following partial database design:
All the tables are dependent on each other so the table bvd_docflow_subdocuments is dependent on the table bdd_docflow_subsets
and the table bvd_docflow_subdocuments is dependent on bvd_docflow_subsets. So I thought I could me smart and use foreign keys on every table (and ON DELETE CASCADE). However the FK are being drilldown how further I go in to the tables.
The problem is the table bvd_docflow_documents has no point having a reference to the 1docflow_documentset_id` PK / FK. Is there a way (and maybe my design is crappy) that only the table standing above it has an FK relationship between the tables and not all the tables above it.
Edit:
More explanation:
In the bvd_docflow_subsets table information is stored about objects to create documents. There is an relation between that table and bvd_docflow_subdocuments table (This table stores master data about all the documents for an subset. (docflow_subset_id is in both tables). This is the link between those to tables.
Going further down we also got the table bvd_docflow_documents this table contains the actual document data. The link between bvd_docflow_documents and bvd_docflow_subdocuments is bvd_docflow_subdocument_id.
On every table I got an foreign key defined so when data is removed on a table all the data linked to that data is also removed.
However when we look to the bvd_docflow_documents table it has all the foreign keys from the other tables (docflow_subset_id and docflow_documentset_id) and there is the problem. The only foreign key needed for that bvd_docflow_documents table is docflow_subdocument_id and no other.
Edit 2
I have changed my design further and removed information that I don't need after initial import of the data.
See the following link for the (total) databse design:
https://sqldbm.com/Project/SQLServer/Share/_AUedvNutCEV2DGLJleUWA
The tables subsets, subdocuments and documents have a many to many relationship so I thought a table in between those 3 documents_subdocuments is the way to go were I define all the different keys for those tables.
I am not used to the database design first and then build it. But, for everything there is a first time, and I try to do make a database that is using standards and is using the power of SQL Server the correct way.
I'll address the bottom-most table and ignore the rest for the most part.
But first some comments. Your schema is simply a model of a system. To provide feedback, one must understand this "system" and how it actually works to evaluate your model. In addition, it is important to understand your entities and your reasons for choosing them and modelling them in the specified manner. Without that understanding all of this guessing based on experience.
And another comment. Slapping an identity column into every table is just lazy modelling IMO. Others will disagree, but you need to also enforce all natural keys. Do you have natural keys? It is rare not to have any. Enforce those that do exist.
And one last comment. Stop the ridiculous pattern of prepending the column names with the table names. And you should really think long and hard about using very long table names. Given what you have, I sense you need a schema for your docflow stuff.
For the documents table, your current PK makes no sense. Again, you've slapped an identity column into the table. By itself, this column is a key for the table. The inclusion of any other columns does not make the key any more "unique" - that inclusion is logical nonsense. Following your pattern, you would designate the identity column as the primary key. But ...
According to your image, the documents table is related to one and only one subdocument. You added a foreign key to that table - which matches the image. You also added additional columns and foreign keys to the "higher" tables. So now a document "points" to a specific subdocument. It also points to a specific subset - which may have no relationship to the subdocument. The same thought applies to the other FK. I have a doubt that this is logically correct. So why do these columns (and related FKs) exist? Perhaps this is the result of premature optimization - which everyone knows is the root of all evil coding. Again, it is impossible to know if this is "right" or even "useful" for your model.
To answer your question "... is there a way", the answer is obviously yes. You remove the columns of which you complain. You added them - Why? Is this perhaps a problem with the tool you are using?
And some last comments. There is nothing special about "varchar(50)". Perhaps this is a place holder that will be updated later. It may also be another sign of laziness. And generally speaking, columns with names like "type" and "code" tend to be foreign keys to "lookup" tables - because people like to add, modify, or remove these sorts categorization values over time. I'm also concerned about the column name overlap among the tables. "Location" exists in multiple tables, as do action_code and action_id. And a column named "id" (action_id) suggests a lookup to another table - is it? Should it be? Is there a relationship between action_id and action_code? From a distance it is impossible to answer any of these questions.
But designing a database is more art than science. Sometimes you just need to create something, populate it with some sample data, and then determine if it works for your needs. Everyone will get something wrong in the first try. That is expected; that is how you learn. The most difficult part is actually completing your first attempt.
This is a 2 part question.
Question 1: I am trying to create a foreign key on a table where I need to turn off the "Check Existing Data on Creation or Re-Enabling". I know theres an option visually but I'm looking for a way to do it programmatically. Is there anyway to do this?
Question 2: I have a code table and two tables A and B that need to reference that code table. I want to have these both referenced from a relationship table but I want to able to use the same column. Can I have 2 foreign keys pointing to the same column?
Yes you can have the same column inthe parent table refer to differnt columns in multiple tables.
I do not recommend turning off checking FK on creation. If you have bad data now, you need to fix it now. Otherwise the first time someone edits one of those records it will fail the FK check then.
From Books online as to why it is a bad idea to use nocheck:
If you do not want to verify new CHECK
or FOREIGN KEY constraints against
existing data, use WITH NOCHECK. We do
not recommend doing this, except in
rare cases. The new constraint will be
evaluated in all later data updates.
Any constraint violations that are
suppressed by WITH NOCHECK when the
constraint is added may cause future
updates to fail if they update rows
with data that does not comply with
the constraint.
So I'm working on just a learning project to expose myself to doing some things I do not get to do at work. I'm just making a simple bug and case tracking app (I know there are a million this is just to work with some tools I don't get to). So I was designing my database and realized I've never actually used Foreign Keys before in any of my projects, I've used them before but never actually setting up a column as a FK. So I've designed my database as follows, which I think is close to correct (at least for the initial layout).
Database Image http://drop.io/download/public/uurp1vxej0abpwu7jsee/895663dedff577359b900cda1726f115b24be90c/Asset/28368622/v3/large_thumbnail
However When I try to add the FK's to the linking Tables I get an error saying, "The tables present in the relationship must have the same number of columns". I'm doing this by in SQLSMS by going to the Keys 'folder' and adding a FK. Is there something that I am doing wrong here, I don't understand why the tables would have to have the same number of columns for me to add a FK relationship between the tables?
When defining a foreign key relationship there are four things you need to specify:
The referring table (foreign key table)
The columns from the referring table that will form the foreign key.
The referred table (primary key table)
The columns from the referred table that form the key.
I'm guessing that you have selected one of the above incorrectly - probably you have forgotten that you need to state the column involved in the relationship twice - once for each table.
Here's a screenshot of how it should look - note that the column is specified twice. In my example the columns have slightly different names to demonstrate that they don't always need to have the same name, but in your case the column names will be the same.
Our application uses an Oracle 10g database where several primary keys are exposed to the end user. Productcodes and such. Unfortunately it's to late to do anything with this, as there are tons of reports and custom scripts out there that we do not have control over. We can't redefine the primary keys or mess up the database structure.
Now some customer want to change some of the primary key values. What they initially wanted to call P23A1 should now be called CAT23MOD1 (not a real example, but you get my meaning.)
Is there an easy way to do this? I would prefer a script of some sort, that could be parametrized to fit other tables and keys, but external tools would be acceptable if no other way exists.
The problem is presumably with the foreign keys that reference the PK. You must define the foreign keys as "deferrable initially immediate", as described in this Tom Kyte article: http://www.oracle.com/technology/oramag/oracle/03-nov/o63asktom.html
That lets you ...
Defer the constraints
Modify the parent value
Modify the child values
Commit the change
Simple.
Oops. A little googling makes it appear that, inexplicably, Oracle does not implement ON UPDATE CASCADE, only ON DELETE CASCADE. To find workarounds google ORACLE ON UPDATE CASCADE. Here's a link on Creating A Cascade Update Set of Tables in Oracle.
Original answer:
If I understand correctly, you want to change the values of data in primary key columns, not the actual constraint names of the keys themselves.
If this is true it can most easily be accomplished redefining ALL the foreign keys that reference the affected primary key constraint as ON UPDATE CASCADE. This means that when you make a change to the primary key value, the engine will automatically update all related values in foreign key tables.
Be aware that if this results in a lot of changes it could be prohibitively expensive in a production system.
If you have to do this on a live system with no DDL changes to the tables involved, then I think your only option is to (for each value of the PK that needs to be changed):
Insert into the parent table a copy of the row with the PK value replaced
For each child table, update the FK value to the new PK value
Delete the parent table row with the old PK value
If you have a list of parent tables and the PK values to be renamed, it shouldn't be too hard to write a procedure that does this - the information in USER_CONSTRAINTS can be used to get the FK-related tables for a given parent table.
I'm defining a database for a customer/ order system where there are two highly distinct types of customers. Because they are so different having a single customer table would be very ugly (it'd be full of null columns as they are pointless for one type).
Their orders though are in the same format. Is it possible to have a CustomerId column in my Order table which has a foreign key to both the Customer Types? I have set it up in SQL server and it's given me no problems creating the relationships, but I'm yet to try inserting any data.
Also, I'm planning on using nHibernate as the ORM, could there be any problems introduced by doing the relationships like this?
No, you can't have a single field as a foreign key to two different tables. How would you tell where to look for the key?
You would at least need a field that tells what kind of user it is, or two separate foreign keys.
You could also put the information that is common for all users in one table and have separate tables for the information that is specific for the user types, so that you have a single table with user id as primary key.
A foreign key can only reference a single primary key, so no. However, you could use a bridge table:
CustomerA <---- CustomerA_Orders ----> Order
CustomerB <---- CustomerB_Orders ----> Order
So Order doesn't even have a foreign key; whether this is desirable, though...
I inherited a SQL Server database where this was done (a single column used in four foreign key relationships with four unrelated tables), so yes, it's possible. My predecessor is gone, though, so I can't ask why he thought it was a good idea.
He used a GUID column ("uniqueidentifier" type) to avoid the ambiguity problem, and he turned off constraint checking on the foreign keys, since it's guaranteed that only one will match. But I can think of lots of reasons that you shouldn't, and I haven't thought of any reasons you should.
Yours does sound like the classical "specialization" problem, typically solved by creating a parent table with the shared customer data, then two child tables that contain the data unique to each class of customer. Your foreign key would then be against the parent customer table, and your determination of which type of customer would be based on which child table had a matching entry.
You can create a foreign key referencing multiple tables. This feature is to allow vertical partioining of your table and still maintain referential integrity. In your case however, this is not applicable.
Your best bet would be to have a CustomerType table with possible columns - CustomerTypeID, CustomerID, where CustomerID is the PK and then refernce your OrderID table to CustomerID.
Raj
I know this is a very old question; however if other people are finding this question through the googles, and you don't mind adding some columns to your table, a technique I've used (using the original question as a hypothetical problem to solve) is:
Add a [CustomerType] column. The purpose of storing a value here is to indicate which table holds the PK for your (assumed) [CustomerId] FK column. Optional - addition of a check constraint (to ensure CustomerType is in CustomerA or CustomerB) will help you sleep better at night.
Add a computed column for each [CustomerType], eg:
[CustomerTypeAId] as case when [CustomerType] = 'CustomerA' then [CustomerId] end persisted
[CustomerTypeBId] as case when [CustomerType] = 'CustomerB' then [CustomerId] end persisted
Add your foreign keys to the calculated (and persisted) columns.
Caveat: I'm primarily in a MSSQL environment; so I don't know how well this translates to other DBMS (ie: Postgres, ORACLE, etc).
As noted, if the key is, say, 12345, how would you know which table to look it up in? You could, I suppose, do something to insure that the key values for the two tables never overlapped, but this is too ugly and painful to contemplate. You could have a second field that says which customer type it is. But if you're going to have two fields, why not have one field for customer type 1 id and another for customer type 2 id.
Without knowing more about your app, my first thought is that you really should have a general customer table with the data that is common to both, and then have two additional tables with the data specific to each customer type. I would think that there must be a lot of data common to the two -- basic stuff like name and address and customer number at the least -- and repeating columns across tables sucks big time. The additional tables could then refer back to the base table. As there is then a single key for the base table, the issue of foreign keys having to know which table to refer to evaporates.
Two distinct types of customer is a classic case of types and subtypes or, if you prefer, classes and subclasses. Here is an answer from another question.
Essentially, the class-table-inheritance technique is like Arnand's answer. The use of the shared-primary-key technique is what allows you to get around the problems created by two types of foreign key in one column. The foreign key will be customer-id. That will identify one row in the customer table, and also one row in the appropriate kind of customer type table, as the case may be.
Create a "customer" table include all the columns that have same data for both types of customer.
Than create table "customer_a" and "customer_b"
Use "customer_id" from "consumer" table as foreign key in "customer_a" and "customer_b"
customer
|
---------------------------------
| |
cusomter_a customer_b