[pmwiki-users] DBauth question

[Marc Cooper]

Jason Frisvold said...
> On 6/27/06, Marc Cooper <gmane at auxbuss.com> wrote:
> > It's in my plan, but I don't know about Ben's for authuser_dbase.
> >
> > I was going to use an array in the user row, but I came up with a good
> > reason for making it a separate table, which escapes me at the moment -
> > probably something to do with the user admin stuff I have in mind.
> 
> Yes, please..  a separate table is best, imo..  At least, thats the
> way I have things right now in my databases..  I don't like stuffing
> arrays into coumns..

I agree, in general. But, for my own uses, an array would be fine. 
Certainly a user/group table is "more correct". In any case, my thinking 
was probably that an array would work but, inevitably, I'd end up using 
it for something else, at which point, a table would be preferable. Kind 
of indicates that I've been 'round the block too many times, I guess 

> > Oh, sadly I a bit about normalizing a database - things from a previous
> > life. However, when you start pulling stuff in from various processes -
> > authentication, authorization, customer care, sales tracking, finance,
> > etc. - you often end up building bridges or end up with SQL from hell;
> > it works, but no-one else can understand it and neither can you a month
> > or two later. A negligible performance hit is often a good trade off for
> > easier maintenance, imo - YMMV.
> 
> Yeah, it definitely depends on the tables you need to create, why,
> etc..  I've seen some really nasty database designs..  In fact,
> there's a database design for an accounting package (multi-million
> dollar package, btw) that will just plain boggle your mind.  It's so
> bad that they created a large poster sized UML style view of the
> database.  It's about 4'x4' and still barely legible.  Boggled my
> mind...

Just visit the dailywtf.com for horror stories above and beyond.

This one:
    http://thedailywtf.com/forums/thread/78463.aspx
is sadly typical, ime. 

Good site for geek therapy, though :-)

-- 
Best,
Marc