Suggestions on table design?

[lorirobn]

Hi,

I am working on a database of all the rooms in a big facility and all the items in the rooms. I have a table for Rooms, a table for Items, and a table to link the two, RoomItems.

My user would like to see a Prototype for each of the room designs. He would be able to view this prototype, and know all the items that go in a typical room for this prototype.

I am deciding whether to put prototype records onto my Room table. There would only be about 5, but I don't feel great about adding these to my table of rooms, since they're not really rooms. My other thought is to create a PrototypeItems table, which would be similar to RoomItems but without the rooms.

Would appreciate any thoughts/suggestions/ideas on this! It always helps to have other opinions...

Thanks in advance,
Lori

 

[Remou]

I like the idea of a prototype table. It would seem to have several uses, such as creating a new room of type A. The set of records could be appended from the prototype table and then modified, to create a 'real' room.

 

[lorirobn]

Thanks, Remou, I like the prototype table, too. Helps to have confirmation of ideas.