Is it bad have a low number for an ID in a database?

Jsn7821

I have been doing some database work and I usually just let auto_incriment start from 1 and go on... so there will be userid 1, 2, 3, etc. Is this bad for any reason? Should I start at 1000 or a number like that?

I don't see any reason to start at a high number, it just seems starting at 1 is "amateur". For example, I would be suprised if there is a userid 1 on this forum. I don't know why though.

planetsim

I see nothing wrong with having an id start at 1 and no there isnt a user with a userid of 1 anymore, perhaps before the forum was upgraded and accounts merged

prashant0812

I dont see any logical reason to start auto increment from 1,2,3 or by any higher nos, but to start with higher nos. will give you advantage when situation arises while working like to convert nos or comparision and for alignment in printing this will helpful to start nos. which does not have prior or trialing blank spaces or '0', as what I understood.

prashant

laserlight

I don't see any reason to start at a high number, it just seems starting at 1 is "amateur".

It isnt.

but to start with higher nos. will give you advantage when situation arises while working like to convert nos or comparision and for alignment in printing this will helpful to start nos. which does not have prior or trialing blank spaces or '0'

There's hardly an advantage - padding is trivial. Besides, if you start with 1000, and have more than 9000 rows, you end up with no advantage.

Shrike

While I agree with laserlight on this, on of my clients did feel the same way as Jsn7821. He runs a recruitment website and felt that URLs with an ?id=1 at the end made it look like he had very few jobs on offer. Clients eh 🙂

Weedpacket

I had one client for whom any such hint as to the size of client base or traffic was to be avoided. So I ended up using a millisecond timestamp. Heighho.