[Babase] Possible Babase mistake (Biograph table)

kfenn kfenn at princeton.edu
Wed Dec 10 12:57:50 EST 2008


Karl O. Pinc wrote:
>
> On 12/10/2008 08:49:55 AM, kfenn wrote:
>>
>> DIC1 and WIR3 were the only two I found with a blank rather than a 
>> NULL name.  This does not affect queries per se... Babase treats 
>> NULLS as blanks and when you query for nulls or even just sort by 
>> name , you see the text output with all the NULLS as blank spaces 
>> (WIR3 and DIC1 are put in with the nulls).  However, I put the nulls 
>> in to make it look nice when you are browsing the table.
>
> There is a bit of a distinction between blank and NULL,
> sometimes it can be important.  See:
> http://www.postgresql.org/docs/8.1/static/functions.html#FUNCTIONS-LOGICAL 
>
> http://www.postgresql.org/docs/8.1/static/functions-comparison.html
>
>>
>> I frequently upload pregnancies as individual files when two 
>> pregnancies occur in the same update period and I'm constrained by 
>> the pregnancy, mtd_cycle validations of chronology.  These two were 
>> input in that way during the first update I did in Babase 2.0 and I 
>> probably didn't specify the 'null' in the upload program.
>
> Do we need a rule saying SNAME should be NULL under this conditions?
>
It would be one less detail I have to remember in the update process.  
I'm all for that!!

Sname and name should be null if the birthdate = deathdate, I think is 
what we need.  But Jeanne and Susan need to say because I don't know if 
the old data look different.  Obviously we don't want nulls overwriting 
data.


Tabby

-- 
Tabby Fenn
Research Assistant

Dept of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
401 Guyot Hall
Princeton University
Princeton, NJ  08544

609 258-6898 (Ph)
609 258-2712 (Fx)



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