hello

after reviewing the first 3 normal forms for databases, i realize i have probably have been misusing the term 'normalization'. as an example, if i have a table that represents an address:
street varchar
city varchar
state varchar
zip char

if there is alot of records, i dont want to have a character value for state. it takes up too much space and prone to errors from misspellings. so i decide to create another table called state with a primary key and a varchar for the longname and a char(2) for the abbreviation.

i used to call this 'normalization'. but i don't see where in the first three normal forms that this is relevant.

i think alot of people would call this 'normalization'. i know this is a small semantic issue but is the terminology false?

thank you for any insight

i'm sorry, i immediatly see that this is in the wrong category. i just joined this forum so please forgive me.

a lot of people do, you are right, and no, that's not really normalization

unfortunately the entire universe of discourse surrounding addresses is positively rife with potholes

if you wish to discuss examples of normalization, please select anything other than addresses and phone numbers

and don't worry, i've moved the thread to Database Concepts and Design