Phoenix.pm: Decisions, decisions

[Beaves at aol.com]

Hello, yous'all  (Jersey boy visits Texas)

OK, I'm looking for some input.  I am wondering the best way to set up a 
certain MySQL table column (or columns).

In my Internet Contact Manager, each group record currently has about 10 
integer columns that indicate various customized priviledege levels for 
certain funtions (such as search, email, invite, postmessage, etc).  Theses 
privililedge levels will not usually be searched, but will of course be 
called up each time that group is accessed.

In general database terms, what are the pros and cons of:
1)Keeping the current modus apparandi (most certainly mispelled...)

versus

2)Changing the priviledges to a single column of a (currently) 10 digit int 
or char, and parsing the privilidges each time the group is accessed.

Just wondering.

To make this a legitimate Perl Post, I'll add an intersting tidbit from 
Damian Conway's book "Object Oriented Perl".  I always wondered exactly how a 
method was searched for before finally giving up.  My concern was usually 
centered around where a given package's AUTOLOAD routine fit in to the 
heirarchy.  The term for this procedure, as I came to find out, is called 
'dispatching' a method.

If $obj->method() is called:
1: Look in the objects class for sub 'method' (simple enough)
2: ELSE, Search @ISA, stepping through each parent class, depth first, left 
to right.
3: ELSE, Look in UNIVERAL for the sub 'method.'
4: ELSE, do steps 1,2,3, but now look for the sub 'AUTOLOAD'.
5: Give up and throw and exception.  ("Can't locate object method "method" 
via package "Class")

If this piques your curiosity, you might want to grab the latest TPJ.  Conway 
has a neat article about Multiple Dispatching and Dispatch Tables, which can 
be used to 'improve' the dispatching of methods to suit your needs.

Lastly, I just finished 'objectizing' the code that my ICM message board 
uses.  I used a lot of the techniques from Conway's book.  It might make for 
topic of  interest to some of you on some hot muggy Tuesday night, and I'd be 
glad to stumble through my design (or plagiarism) steps.  I am curious to see 
how others approach the initial design phase of programming.

OK, Yous'all can go now...


Tim

shameless ICM plug:
http://www.azwebs.com/cgi-local/icm/icm.cgi
100% perl generated, and MySQL used exclusively