Re: complex referential integrity constraints

Robert Haas wrote:
> I sort of think that this kind of stuff belongs in a separate table
> somehow. For example in this case I would want to:

I wasn't suggesting otherwise. A constraint is a constraint; whether it
involves an extra table or not wasn't really relevant until now
(apparently).

> CREATE TABLE attack_probability (
> attacker_type_id integer not null references animal_type (id),
> victim_type_id integer not null references animal_type (id),
> percent_chance integer not null,

Personally I would prefer something that can hold decimals, a numeric
fe. And I usually add cascading behaviour definitions explicitly.

> primary key (attacker_type_id, victim_type_id)
> );
>
> ...and then declare that the CONSTRAINT on the "maulings" table is that
> if I look up the types of the attacker and victim, that pair of types
> must be present in the attack_probability table with percent_chance > 0.

This was pretty much what I had in mind. Not _exactly_, as I didn't
concern myself with the implementation details yet. But it pretty much
boils down to what you suggested, yes.

> I guess my point here is that I think in your proposal you are letting
> domain-specific data creep into the schema. It's the job of the schema
> to enforce integrity constraints, but not to know specifically how
> things work. The fact (if it is a fact) that the chance of one type of
> animal attacking another can be captured as a probability (rather than,
> say, one probability for the day time and another probability for the
> night time, or one probability for each specific animal rather than each
> animal type, or I don't know what's going on and want to infer the
> probabilities from the data after I've gathered it) is domain-specific.
> I don't really want the information about attack probabilities (or
> whatever) to be something that's hardcoded in my schema; I want it to be
> part of the data in the schema, with the schema enforcing such
> constraints on that data as I may see fit to define. I don't want to
> have to select things out of system tables to find out attack
> probabilities. Also, as a practical matter, I suspect that such a setup
> would result in an absurdly complex constraint language.

I was merely pointing out the possibility of such a constraint - maybe
"business rule" is more appropriate (but isn't that a constraint as well?).
In the original suggestions this wasn't possible, it simply stated that
wolves cannot attack lions - which isn't necessarily true.

I suppose that's the point I was trying to make in general; the whole
who-attacks-who business isn't that black-and-white - more like
different shades of gray.

In the end you'll have to make a decision about what combinations are
possible depending on what you want to get out of your database. It may
not be necessary to get into this much detail - or it may. Not for me to
say.

> ...Robert

--
Alban Hertroys
alban(at)magproductions(dot)nl

magproductions b.v.

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