From: MA

To: Editor

Date: 02 Apr 2004

 

If an application validates referential integrity, and there is no other way to access the database, does it need to exist in the database?    Does the existence of inferred relationships and indices that represent those relationships suffice?

 

 

From: Fabian Pascal

To: MA

 

The sum total of integrity constraints on a database, of which RI constraints is but one kind, is the best approximation the DBMS has of what the database means to users and, therefore, it is the DBMS-understood meaning of the database. A DBMS unaware of constraints has a limited understanding of the meaning of the database and, therefore, cannot protect the integrity of the data and the results derived from it. See PRACTICAL DATABASE FOUNDATIONS paper #4 Un-muddling Modeling.

 

Integrity is a central, critical database, not application function for all sorts of reasons that I explain in my book. Application-enforced integrity is, essentially, data management without DBMS. That's what we did before we had DBMSs, and we invented DBMSs because that proved not to be cost-effective.

 

 

Ed. Note: A PRACTICAL DATABASE FOUNDATIONS paper on integrity is in the works.

 

 

 

Posted 05/28/04