Figure 1-3, Nontransactional and Transactional Data Format


This figure illustrates conversion of a nontransactional to transactional format. 


The figure shows two tables. The table on the left shows data in nontransactional format. The table on the right shows the same data in transactional format. 


The nontransactional format table has columns that are named for the attributes 
ID, age, gender, and income. There is one row for each record. The first record has data values of ID = 1, age = 25, gender = M, and income = 30 K. 


The transactional format table has three columns (transactional format tables always have these three columns): ID, attribute, and value. The first record of the nontransactional table corresponds to the first three rows of the transactional table: ID = 1, attribute = age, value = 25. Row 2 has ID = 1, attribute = gender, and value = M. Row 3 has ID = 1, attribute = income, value = 30K. 


Note that in transactional format, all data values must be specified as the single data type NUMBER. This results from binning all values.