🏠 Stonehenge Services
⬅️ Back to Life Memories
STORY

License Plate Database Keys

Type: story
Participants: Randal Schwartz

  • License Plate Database Keys

  • A funny technical anecdote about how vanity license plates caused database errors at a car maintenance shop, linking to my history of vehicle ownership.

  • The License Plate Upgrades

    • I owned a Toyota MR-2 and had the vanity license plate BINARY.
    • Later, I upgraded the plate to SOURCE.
    • Eventually, I moved the SOURCE plate first to a Toyota 4-Runner, and then to my Chevrolet Camaro Z28.
    • This plate migration history corresponds directly to the vehicles documented in my History of Owned Vehicles.

  • The Database Mix-Up

    • The maintenance shop where I took my car organized customer records using license plate numbers as the primary key.
    • When I brought the MR-2 back after upgrading the plate, they asked: "First time here?" and had to annotate the record to redirect SOURCE to BINARY.
    • A year later, when I brought the 4-Runner in with the same SOURCE plate, the database got completely confused: "Wait, this isn't an MR-2!"
    • It stands as a perfect real-world example of database design using unstable unique keys.
These facts are as Randal recalls them, but much time has passed for most of this. If you find a factual error, please email realmerlyn@gmail.com.