Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!swrinde!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!ncar!husc6!lange!bochner
From: bochner@lange.harvard.EDU (Harry Bochner)
Newsgroups: comp.databases
Subject: Re: Share table between databases in Informix?
Keywords: Informix, shared table, multiuser
Message-ID: <4037@husc6.harvard.edu>
Date: 29 Aug 90 21:39:26 GMT
References: <1990Aug29.165603.15697@diku.dk>
Sender: news@husc6.harvard.edu
Reply-To: bochner@lange.harvard.EDU (Harry Bochner)
Distribution: comp
Organization: Aiken Computation Laboratory, Harvard University
Lines: 29

In article <1990Aug29.165603.15697@diku.dk>, jensen@skinfaxe.diku.dk
(J|rgen Jensen) writes:
 > I remember seeing out of the corner of the eye in this group
 > someone mentioning a problem with an Informix database where some
 > of the files (tables?) were not physically located with the rest
 > of the stuff in the usual place, but in some other directory
 > somewhere else.
...
 >    + Might this feature be utilized in a set-up where several
 >      users with each their personalized database wants to do
 >      look-ups in a large shared table located somewhere else?
...
 >    + Any drawbacks to this scheme?  As compared to the
 >      alternatives - which are: Copying the large file to all the
 >      personalized databases on regular basis, *or* incorporating
 >      the personalized databases into one aggregate monster
 >      mulituser database.

It depends on what sort of personalization you're talking about, but my
guess is that the last alternative might well be the best. This sounds
like a nightmare to maintain in any case, but consider this scenario:
you come up with an enhancement that affects all users. If you have n
databases, you necessarily have to reimplement the enhancement n times.
If there's only one, you should, ideally, be able to implement it once,
and then just check for bad interactions for each of the n users. The
latter seems preferable to me ...

Harry Bochner
bochner@endor.harvard.edu