Re: variation of "weak link" lookup table

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On Wed, Jun 23, 2004 at 08:47:05PM -0500, step2@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx.xxx wrote:
> and i have artist alias setup like so:
> artistid1 | artistid2
>      1    |     4
>      4    |     1

Do you need to have this database structure? This sort of thing is usually
easier solved if this table doesn't work both ways - i.e. there's a
"deinitive" version of the artist which is only ever in the first column
of this, and all the aliases are in the second column...

In you're set-up you're duplicating information. If you later discovered
that you'd accidentally linked artist 1 and artist 4 you'd have to
delete two rows from your table, rather than just 1 - an anathema to
most database designers!

Tony