I found an obscure reference that allowed me to do what I wanted.

Unfortunately, I tried the tables you suggested, but you cannot get the information about the columns through it. ...

ERWin and ER Studio are 2 of the best.  I have used both of them and prefer ERWin.  But it is pricy $3,500 retail.  As to the printing issue mentioned,...

Sounds like the new Access engine will help the guys out that want a poor design...

http://www.pcw.co.uk/articles/print/2163161

Look in the dictionary, and you might find "bad design" in the definition of generic.  Is it any wonder with people still designing garbage after having good design principles for...

What kind of category?

Depending on how they are used, you can use a lookup across multiple tables.  Category for example could have 3 colums and be related to another table,...

It depends on the size of the drives on the server and if you are the hosting company or if you are buying the hosting.

Many companies limit the size of...

You can install SQL Express or MSDE which is a limited version of SQL Server.  The install of either one can be included in the install of your application.  I...

I think of this as an example of a FoxPro database programmer that thinks he has graduated to SQL Server.  While it will work for small implementations and in small...

Only if you are....:-)

NULL is an unknown value.

But, entering UNKNOWN into a column as a value says that you have evaluated the input and there is enough information (or not) to define it...

If you really want to optimize it for performance, make it a tinyint.  Create a lookup table with all the appropriate values in it and use that.  Numerics are always...

"the purpose of null is 'unitialized'"  Not in any of the books that I have read. 

If you are worried about performance problems based on varchar(1) and char(1) then there are...

Because of my indoctrination by Oracle DBAs, I use varchar and never use char.  The reason for nvarchar would be for international character purposes.  I have never seen a compelling...

varchar(1)

Null is unknown. That is the purpose of null.

>How bout

>Char(1)

>M (Male)

>F (Female)

>U (Unknown)

>B (Both)

Pretty bad if you cannot even figure out what you want to build a database to do.  If you want design help that is one thing, but you really need...