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A non-primary key that can be used to identify only one row in a table. Alternate keys may be used like a primary key in a single-table select. Foreign. A key that has migrated to another entity. At the most basic definition, "a key is a unique identifier", [1] so unique key is a pleonasm.
Surrogate key. A surrogate key (or synthetic key, pseudokey, entity identifier, factless key, or technical key[citation needed]) in a database is a unique identifier for either an entity in the modeled world or an object in the database. The surrogate key is not derived from application data, unlike a natural (or business) key.
Unique identifier. A unique identifier ( UID) is an identifier that is guaranteed to be unique among all identifiers used for those objects and for a specific purpose. [1] The concept was formalized early in the development of computer science and information systems. In general, it was associated with an atomic data type .
Primary key. In the relational model of databases, a primary key is a specific choice of a minimal set of attributes ( columns) that uniquely specify a tuple ( row) in a relation ( table ). [a] [1] Informally, a primary key is "which attributes identify a record," and in simple cases constitute a single attribute: a unique ID.
Natural key. A natural key (also known as business key [1] or domain key [2]) is a type of unique key in a database formed of attributes that exist and are used in the external world outside the database (i.e. in the business domain or domain of discourse ). [3] In the relational model of data, a natural key is a superkey and is therefore a ...
A candidate key (or minimal superkey) is a superkey that can't be reduced to a simpler superkey by removing an attribute. [3] For example, in an employee schema with attributes employeeID , name , job , and departmentID , if employeeID values are unique then employeeID combined with any or all of the other attributes can uniquely identify ...
Candidate key. A candidate key, or simply a key, of a relational database is any set of columns that have a unique combination of values in each row, with the additional constraint that removing any column could produce duplicate combinations of values. A candidate key is a minimal superkey, [1] i.e., a superkey that doesn't contain a smaller one.
Identity column. An identity column is a column (also known as a field) in a database table that is made up of values generated by the database. This is much like an AutoNumber field in Microsoft Access or a sequence in Oracle. Because the concept is so important in database science, many RDBMS systems implement some type of generated key ...