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RE: To Normalize or Not to Normalize

  • To: Len.bullard@i..., xml-dev@l...
  • Subject: RE: To Normalize or Not to Normalize
  • From: Mitch Amiano <mamiano@n...>
  • Date: Fri, 16 Dec 2005 10:31:33 -0500
  • User-agent: Mozilla Thunderbird 0.7.3 (Windows/20040803)

reluctance to touch
I try to gauge the impact across the system's users and the architecture 
you want to get to. 

Changing the structures, and the refactoring of code that goes along 
with those changes, opens up the system to subtle failures. Especially 
if you don't yet fully understand the reasoning behind the existing 
structures, you may later find that what you thought was a more 
normalized form was not itself ideal. I'd prioritize those changes based 
on an understanding of the history of faults that the existing system 
has, using bug tracking history and anecdotal evidence of problem areas. 
Then look at the features you want to get to. Put your resources toward 
the biggest bang for the buck.

Leaving fields as-is is a recipe for having to fix something later on, 
building workarounds to the flaws despite your best efforts to ignore 
the problem. If you think there is something wrong now, there probably is.

What sort of tests exist to verify that the structures and in-use 
queries actually perform as assumed? Sometimes structures which are left 
in an apparently schizophrenic state only work because of code that's 
been hacked to make up for the inconsistencies, leaving latent bugs. 
Your apparent reluctance to touch the structures suggests a need for 
unit tests.

Names are almost trivial to change, make a little impact on legibility, 
but expose the users to the greatest risk of not-so-subtle failures. 
Especially if they've constructed their own systems that depend upon 
those names.  I wouldn't hesitate to rename given other structural 
changes, or introduction of alternative interfaces/views, but it is 
dubious on its own.

Regards,

- Mitch

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