Microsoft® SQL Server 2008 R2 Unleashed

Defining Columns

A table is defined as a collection of columns. Each column represents an attribute of the database table and has characteristics that define its scope and the type of data it can contain. In defining a column, you must assign a name and a data type. For consistency and readability, the column names should adhere to a naming convention that you define for your environment. Naming conventions often use a set of standard suffixes that indicate the type of data the column will contain. For example, you can add the Date suffix to a column name (for example, OrderDate) to identify it as a column that contains date/time data, or you can add the suffix ID (for example, PrinterID) to indicate that the column contains a unique identifier. ...