[thelist] Magic data table

[Ken Moore]

>Edwin Horneij wrote:


>It is impressive, but strikes me as somewhat unorthodox.

The reason it is "unorthodox" is because most people who would attempt 
serious projects know better than to do something like that. As a database 
programmer of 20 years, I have had very much training and experience. If you 
proceed with this like it is, you will be forever rigging work arounds to 
make it work. AND getting any type os meaningful data out of it will be 
almost impossible.

>My predecessor seems to have also written PHP code that changes the
>structure of the table where necessary.

This works only for limited uses where extreme flexibility in needed. For 
example, if the same data is needed to be accessed by two different systems 
that store it differently, such as date types, the meta data (that is, data 
about the data) may be needed.


>Is this method standard practice?
NO!


>It is not too late for me to make changes to the database structure
The start making the changes, yesterday, if possible.


>I don't want to fix something that may not be broken.

It IS broken. Fix it now. If someone complains about the time and cost, 
explain to them that they are going to pay the price one way or the other - 
Either short and cheap now or long and expensive later.

Contact me off line if you want to do so.

Ken

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