[AccessD] Estimating Help

I believe both of us are talking about leaving it turned on for the average
user.  This is a DBA tool, not an end user tool.  Of course I have turned on
Cascade delete in order to do cleanup, but I am the administrator (or acting
as one).  I turn it back off when I am done.  My users can click delete to
their hearts content.  If there is a child record, JET politely informs them
to take a flying leap.

It is very difficult (without applying Access Security or setting cascade
delete off) to prevent users from deleting things.  Queries and forms may,
even unintentionally, allow a user to delete something.  "Power users" are
often granted the right (by management) to go in and build queries to do
things.  If cascade delete is turned on, the risk of an "accidental" delete
is pretty high.  I would say even with security applied it is pretty high!

Of course I also went to a lot of effort to design an active / trash system
to back up their lack of "delete" ability.  Over the years I can't even
count the number of times I simply went in and "undeleted" records that a
user had tried to delete.

In the end, it doesn't matter whether you use Security or turn off cascade
delete, you must prevent the $5 / hour data entry person (and the $60k /
year manager) from disemboweling the database by deleting some parent object
with a thousand child / grandchild / great-grandchild records.  If you are
just turning it on by default and not considering the consequences then you
should be buying large malpractice insurance policies.

JMOOC

John W. Colby
Colby Consulting
www.ColbyConsulting.com

-----Original Message-----
From: accessd-admin at databaseadvisors.com
[mailto:accessd-admin at databaseadvisors.com]On Behalf Of Stuart McLachlan
Sent: Saturday, February 01, 2003 4:54 PM
To: Arthur Fuller; accessd at databaseadvisors.com
Subject: Re: [AccessD] Estimating Help


> I didn't mean that the rows were disappearing, but rather that they
> disappeared from reports, since their FK referents were gone. I would
never
> be so foolish as to turn cascade-delete on anywhere in any serious
database
> :-)

Why "never"? Why do you think it is foolish?

Admittedly you need to think hard about it before switching it on, but there
are many
instances where it is a powerful and useful tool which saves writing a lot
of unnecessary
code.   I can think of many cases where you need to delete all children when
a parent is
removed. Why re-invent the wheel and risk getting it wrong.



--
Lexacorp Ltd
http://www.lexacorp.com.pg
Information Technology Consultancy, Software Development,System Support.



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