Re: Quote from student, after teaching Pick

Hi Mark
Answer embedded
"Mark Brown" <mbrown@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
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"Bill H" <someone@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
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Mark:

Now you've started something! :-)

That was kind of the point.


One example of a multi-part key is an A/P invoice; Vendor * Invoice.

So is that easier for the computer or for you? The point is that YOU know
everything already. You know the vendor and you know the invoice number.
Go get V*I. Why is V*I any more unique than item 12345? Selecting the
file by vendor or by invoice will be slower because it has to be processed
twice every time.

The whole point is that one needs another file to tell one what on earth
12345 refers to when you wish to look up the one item, thus seriously
complicating the update and recall. However one can fix the sort issue with
V*I simply by making them fixed length and even without this the system does
the work on sort keeping the create and recall situation simpler.



Secondly, you ask "why store what can be calculated?".

I agree that there needs to be redundancy with accounting. That's not
what I was talking about. We typically store Qty and Price. Do we really
need another field for Extended, or can we just multiply the two fields in
a correlative or Basic function?

We need to store the Extension in the final 2 decimal form whereas qty and
price may typically be 4 decimal with another calculation taken to 6
decimals places and then rounded for GST. Not only would this represent a
lot of extra work and source of error on every line it would also fall foul
of the rounding that may have occurred at payment - Cash must be rounded to
5 cents whereas Card is exact and may even incur a further charge for using
the card.

Many thanks for the discussion it helps me to reconsider ideas that may need
have become almost set in stone.
Regards
Peter McMurray


You asked... :-)

Bill

Always good to hear from you.

Mark



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