Database Design for Mere Mortals™: A Hands-On Guide to Relational Database Design, Second Edition

Modification Anomalies

We've just discussed the concept behind the Normalization process, but we didn't discuss why you should even go through the process in the first place. (You would have thought I'd mention it before this moment, but you'll soon see why it makes more sense to discuss it here.)

The main reason you put your tables through the Normalization process is to ensure sound, efficient table structures. Improperly designed tables typically exhibit poor data integrity and are subject to modification anomalies and data dependency problems. If you fail to address these problems, you'll find that the information you retrieve from the database will be inconsistent, inaccurate, and in some extreme cases, totally invalid.

In order to ...