[kforge-dev] uuids: are they a good idea

Rufus Pollock rufus.pollock at okfn.org
Tue Nov 1 18:59:54 UTC 2005


The idea of using uuids in the database as opposed to simple integer ids 
has been mooted. Suggested benefits are:

   * Increased portability across databases and architectures
   * Global uniqueness making it
      * easier to integrate different projects if that were every necessary
      * do system upgrades (ids are currently used for directory naming 
on disk)

Potential costs are:

   * slower (?)
   * not as reliable as standard integer ids
   * no built in uuid type (at least in postgresql) and would have to 
find a python implementation
   * it will involve time and energy to change

This is still very much undecided but if we are to make the change it 
would be good to do it before 1.0 so comments on this issue are 
particularly welcome.

Regards,

Rufus




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