On Thu, 5 Mar 2009, Eric Peterson wrote: > I'm trying to convince certain people in our company that we need to > normalize some (maybe all) of our database to 1NF. I'm trying to avoid > situations where we need to make database schema and code updates to add > a 2nd phone number to a user in the system as an example. > > They want evidence that such a database is better and that's it's not > too complicated to understand. How can they not understand? I have no formal DBA training.. I had actually never heard of 1NF until your post, when I went and looked it up, but it totally aligns with what I've been doing for ages when I design a schema. It's just logical! I'm assuming these are people who are either new to DB's or just not all that experienced? If you just go to the Wikipedia page for 1NF, there are a lot of good arguments. Most database books are also going to make a good argument for it. Or just point them at this thread.. I highly doubt anyone on the list will argue against normalizing the DB's. ;) -nc