Re: Recursive Arrays 101

On 10/26/2015 08:43 AM, Jim Nasby wrote:
> On 10/25/15 8:10 PM, David Blomstrom wrote:
>> @ Adrian Klaver: Oh, so you're suggesting I make separate tables for
>> kingdoms, classes and on down to species. I'll research foreign keys and
>> see what I can come up with. I hope I can make separate tables for
>> mammal species, bird species, fish species, etc. There are just so many
>> species - especially fish - the spreadsheets I use to organize them are
>> just about maxed out as it is.
>
> The suggestion is simply to have 7 tables:
>
> CREATE TABLE kingdom(
> kingdom_id serial PRIMARY KEY
> , kingdom_name text NOT NULL
> , ...
> );
> CREATE TABLE phylum(
> phylum_id serial PRIMARY KEY
> , kingdom_id int NOT NULL REFERENCES kingdom
> , ...
> );
> CREATE TABLE class(
> ...
> );
>
> and so-on.
Seems to me that if life boils down to four attributes one would have a
single table with those four attributes on the particular life form.
Now, the four attributes could be ids into definitional tables but I
suspect the querying will be done string/name so why complicate the
lookups: make the names a foreign key in the defs if necessary.

Personally I think the recursive structure is the way to go.