Re: table relationship

Three tables seems wasteful, and could mean that you have to do three queries when looking for someone. Why not approach it this way. Users table - info on all users, regardless of category Levels table - sets different access levels, e.g. clients, staff, administrators User_levels table - assigns levels to user id's This would give you more long-term flexibility as you would only have to extend the levels table to add granularity of access or control levels. I'd also have a look at various network permission schemes, because there are subtleties that are not immediately apparent when working up an access scheme. Cheers - Miles Thompson At 09:35 AM 3/10/2003 +0000, shaun wrote:

Hi, I am creating a web site which will have different types of users: Administrators, clients and staff. Is it possible/good practice to have 3 tables related to one table i.e.

                             USER
                             user_id (PK)
                                  |
          ____________|____________
          |                       |                        |
          |                       |                        |
Administrator        Client                  Staff
admin_id(PK)       client_id(PK)       staff_id(PK)
user_id(FK)          user_id(FK)        user_id(FK)

Thanks in advance for any advice offered. -- PHP Database Mailing List (http://www.php.net/) To unsubscribe, visit: http://www.php.net/unsub.php