This is actually a very good point and from what I have seen Orphaned records is a problem in the database; however, I do not think that cascading updates/deletes would be the best way to fix the problem. Simply because someone could easily make a mistake when customizing their own DB and do exactly as John pointed out. I believe something a little smarter would be required. I have thought about writing a application tool that would systematically search through the DB looking for orphan records and then present a report to the user letting them know what it found and where it found it. Then the user would be able to decided which entries they want to delete and the program would delete them. I do intend to do something along these lines as soon as I am done with current projects I am working on.
|