Best Practice for Value Lists in Another Table?

[Rich S]

Hi, all:

I recognize the wisdom of having a separate table for value lists, but should that one table hold all of the non-custom value list fields, or should each value list field have its own table?

For example, say you have three different value list fields: fruit type, countries and company names; they're completely unrelated to each other. If you were to put all three in the same table every record would have at least two empty fields (since each record would have one of its three fields filled with data.) Is that a "don't care" issue, or is it better to have a table dedicated to each one so there aren't any empty records at all to contend with? ...or am I in the ozone (again) worrying about this?

[mr_vodka]

If you were to put all three in the same table every record would have at least two empty fields (since each record would have one of its three fields filled with data.)

This isn't necessarily true. You can have 3 fields. The ID, the text, and a VL category.

That being said, its a matter of personal preference and as with most things it depends on your solution. There are cases where having separate tables make sense while from a maintenance perspective it may be easier to have them in one.