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Message-ID: <36af4bed0805202240v5fbdd6bcv75643a6488cd1daf@mail.gmail.com>
Date: Wed, 21 May 2008 11:10:43 +0530
From: "Robins Tharakan" <tharakan@gmail.com>
To: pgsql-performance@postgresql.org
Subject: Varchar pkey instead of integer
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Hi,

I am currently designing a database and wanted to know something that may
sound trivial, but I thought its still good to confirm before dumping
millions of rows in it.

The design requires a few master tables with very limited rows, for e.g.
currency_denomination table could at the max have a few records like million
/ billion / crore (used in india) / lacs (india specific) and so on.

Now what I wanted to ask was whether its any different to have the
primary-keys in such master tables as text/varchar rather than integer ?
i.e. Can I use a character varying(10) and use the text 'million' /
'billion' instead of a serial / integer type ?

p.s.: I am not as much concerned with the size that it'd take on the data
tables, as much as the fact that the select / insert performances shouldn't
suffer. However, if that increase in size (per data record) may make a
considerable impact on the performance, I would certainly want to take that
into account during design phase.

Any pointers / replies appreciated.

Regards,
*Robins Tharakan*

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<span style="font-family: verdana,sans-serif;">Hi,</span><br style="font-family: verdana,sans-serif;"><br style="font-family: verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: verdana,sans-serif;">I am currently designing a database and wanted to know something that may sound trivial, but I thought its still good to confirm before dumping millions of rows in it.</span><br style="font-family: verdana,sans-serif;">
<br style="font-family: verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: verdana,sans-serif;">The design requires a few master tables with very limited rows, for e.g. currency_denomination table could at the max have a few records like million / billion / crore (used in india) / lacs (india specific) and so on.</span><br style="font-family: verdana,sans-serif;">
<br style="font-family: verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: verdana,sans-serif;">Now what I wanted to ask was whether its any different to have the primary-keys in such master tables as text/varchar rather than integer ? i.e. Can I use a character varying(10) and use the text &#39;million&#39; / &#39;billion&#39; instead of a serial / integer type ?</span><br style="font-family: verdana,sans-serif;">
<br style="font-family: verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: verdana,sans-serif;">p.s.: I am not as much concerned with the size that it&#39;d take on the data tables, as much as the fact that the select / insert performances shouldn&#39;t suffer. However, if that increase in size (per data record) may make a considerable impact on the performance, I would certainly want to take that into account during design phase.</span><br style="font-family: verdana,sans-serif;">
<br style="font-family: verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: verdana,sans-serif;">Any pointers / replies appreciated.</span><br style="font-family: verdana,sans-serif;"><br style="font-family: verdana,sans-serif;">
<span style="font-family: verdana,sans-serif;">Regards,</span><br style="font-family: verdana,sans-serif;"><b style="font-family: verdana,sans-serif;">Robins Tharakan</b><br style="font-family: verdana,sans-serif;">

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