RE: Interesting question and debate on ddl tables withdatefieldsthatwill not always have a value

It can be a lot of work, but some suggest users should not have access
to base tables. Rather, end users would query views that can among other
things, denormalize data and convert NULLed fields to another value. For
the most part, if a user notices an invoice number field is empty (zero
or blank), it isn't hard to understand the corresponding invoice amount
would also be zero.

In my opinion, NULLs are useful for data storage requirements, and less
useful for reporting requirements. Especially if non-IT / end users are
involved.

Loyd Goodbar
Business Systems
BorgWarner Shared Services
662-473-5713
-----Original Message-----
From: midrange-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:midrange-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Mike Cunningham
Sent: Wednesday, October 15, 2008 9:01 PM
To: Midrange Systems Technical Discussion
Subject: RE: Interesting question and debate on ddl tables
withdatefieldsthatwill not always have a value

So far this discussion has been focused on IT professionals and the
proper user of null fields. What happens when you bring a non-IT user
into this discussion and they are using some package to query that same
database. Are these employees going to understand the concept of a null
field and how to get the correct results from their query when a field
is null capable? Will they understand that field = blank is not the same
as field = null?