Database Tips: Use the Atomic Principle

Early physicists and chemists discovered it is much easier to join atoms together than to split them apart. Remember this when designing your database.

Use several individual fields rather than a single field that combines several together. It can be difficult, and sometimes impossible, to extract the required data element from a combined field. However if you have individual fields, you can always find ways to join them together.

An example of this would be to create fields for firstname and lastname rather than have a combined field for name. With separate fields, you can sort by lastname, and select data based on firstname. A combined field would make one, the other, or both difficult to do. While you are at it, include fields for title and initials, a common name (or nick-name), and maiden name. You may even want to include fields such as alias1, alias 2, dba1, and dba2.

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