Store an array instead of relating tables?

NeoGeo

Suppose I have one table called user_information and it has several data fields to store information about users, but there are some types of data fields that might have multiple entries - for instance, phone numbers. They might have one or five, I could create a table that stores phone numbers and stores the user information entry id so I could do a query like "select from phone_numbers where user_info_id = $ID".

My question, is it possible to just store an array of phone numbers, if so what type of entry is this, and would it be easier to store an array or stay with the relation?

I want to do this because there are multiple data fields like phone numbers that require a variable ammount of entries, so I could have an array with data in a format something like 'phone' => '000 000 0000', 'fax' => '000 000 0000', 'email' => 'john@doe.com' and it just seems like having an array like this would be easier than creating several tables with relations.

Any feedback?

Thanks,
Ben

NeoGeo

I didn't think that one through enough haha..

in case your wondering of course it is better to create another table with a relation because instead of storing an array in format 'type'=>'value' you just create a table with a type and value data field. Tables have much more functionality (sorting, searching, etc) than arrays (duh)

Ben

drawmack

relational databases are created the way they are for a reason, read a little ot the history on them if you want to know those reasons. I will make an example of this particular case

Here is the data layout

method 1 (two tables)
  user_info
    userid
    name
    username
    password

  phone_nos
    userid
    phone_number
    designation

method 2 (one table)
  user_info
    userid
    name
    username
    password
    phone_numbers

Let's say I want to get someone's work number.

Under method 1:
I construct a sql statement that gets the person's work number and relates it to their username using the two tables and their userid based on the designation field of the phone_numbers table, then I echo that number

Under method 2:
I construct a sql query that gets all the person's phone numbers. Then I write the code to parse that information into arrays or classes. Then I write the code to search those arrays or classes for a work number. Then I display the person's work number.

I think I'll stick with normalization rules the way they are cause people a lot smarter then me thunk them up.