Microsoft® SQL Server™ 2008 All-In-One Desk Reference For Dummies®
by Robert D. Schneider, Darril Gibson
IX.B.5. How Can I Simplify My Data?
For database administrators, making sense of information can be confusing, especially if the environment sports a substantial number of tables with complex interrelationships. If you find it difficult, imagine how laborious it is for your users and application developers. Luckily, none of you have to suffer in silence. One way to create a more transparent picture of your data is to take advantage of views.
Think of a view as a window into your information, one that can span the entire database to retrieve results. By pre-building all the joins and stripping any extraneous details, you can make this window much simpler than the underlying data. The end result is that your users and developers can work with the view, rather than the base database tables. To see how views can make things better for your enterprise, take a look at Book III, Chapter 8.
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