[AccessD] On DB Bloat, Bad DB Design, and various

Actually our company's website will let you put in 255 characters for an
address. LOL.

However, the credit card company's site will only accept (I think) 35
characters).  We record both billing and shipping information, and forward
the 'billing' info to the CC site (to reduce repeat entry).  As long as the
payment is accepted, what we have set for shipping information remains
unaltered, and is limited to 255 characters per field.

Drew

-----Original Message-----
From: accessd-bounces at databaseadvisors.com
[mailto:accessd-bounces at databaseadvisors.com]On Behalf Of Stuart Sanders
Sent: Tuesday, June 01, 2004 1:43 AM
To: 'Access Developers discussion and problem solving'
Subject: RE: [AccessD] On DB Bloat, Bad DB Design, and various



I know this is already a week old, but I am only just now catching up on
an interesting topic and thought I'd "share" my office address.

Business Information Technology Solutions Limited (49 char)
1001 Workingberg Commercial Building (36 char)
41-47 Marble Road
North Point
Hong Kong

As you can see the first line is 49 characters.  I have yet to do
business with an "Internationalised" US company's website that simple
allows me to enter my address as it stands without jumping through some
hoop or another.  To be honest, the US is far from being the only
offender on this.  Trust me I know.

- Invariable it requires shortening (sometimes severely) the first two
lines.  It is not uncommon for 25 letters to be the maximum allowed.  I
have seen business names in this part of the world that are over 100
characters in length.  
- It is also not uncommon that 2 address lines are all that is provided.
- 99% of sites require a postal code.  I don't have one.
- 99% of sites require a state.  I don't have one.

I sometimes wonder whether there would be a market for an address
datachecker with business rules on a country by country basis.  But then
since it is we the "user" that have to jumo through the hoops, probably
not.  I do know that some sites have lost business if they are too
strict on their data entry rules.

Stuart

> -----Original Message-----
> From: accessd-bounces at databaseadvisors.com 
> [mailto:accessd-bounces at databaseadvisors.com] On Behalf Of 
> Scott Marcus
> Sent: Wednesday, 26 May 2004 12:07 AM
> To: Access Developers discussion and problem solving
> Subject: RE: [AccessD] On DB Bloat, Bad DB Design, and various
> 
> 
> Now you are being ridiculous. These are just examples. I 
> think you would rarely run into and address line greater than 
> 50, but that's not the point.
> 
> There are things like the backend up grader to do these jobs 
> for you. Don't take it personal, I just find this an 
> interesting and entertaining topic.
> 
> Scott Marcus
> TSS Technologies, Inc.
> marcus at tsstech.com
> (513) 772-7000

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