Creating a New Class Key

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This topic describes how to create a key as the unique identifier for a class. The class must exist before creating the key.

Keys can have a single member or multiple members. Keys must be unique across a catalog.

You can create a single-valued key in two ways:

• Implicitly: Set the value of the GenerateKeyDef column to True (1) in the clsdef table, and set the value of the IsPrimaryKey to True (1) in the memdef table. Explicitly creating a new instance in the Class Key Definition table is then unnecessary.

• Explicitly: First, create a new row in the clskeydef table, populate the columns, and save the changes. For information about the Class Key Definition, see Keydef Table: Key Definition Metadata.

  Second, define the member of the key by creating a new row in the keymem table. For information about this step, see Creating a New Key Member.

For multi-member keys, you can only define the member of the key in the keymem table.

This example (which originated in Creating a New Class) continues by creating the (multi-member) key for the OrderFormHeader class.

The following table lists the columns and values of the clskeydef table for the OrderFormHeader class. Unspecified optional columns are not shown. In the R/O column, R = required, O = optional.

Example - Step 4

Create a new key for the OrderFormHeader class.

'Create an instance in the Class Key Definition table.
   recNew.Open "Key/myOrderFormHeaderKey", cnnConnection, _
    adModeWrite, adCreateOverwrite

'Set the attributes.
   recNew("ClassDefName") = "OrderFormHeader"
   recNew("Description") = "Unique key for the OrderFormHeader class."

'Save the new row.
   recNew("__Commit") = 1
   recNew.Fields.Update
   recNew.Close

The next step is to define the members of this key. Continue to Creating a New Key Member.

See Also

Other Resources

Extending the Data Warehouse Logical Schema

Creating a New Key Member

Creating a New Class

OrderFormHeader