Table Procedure Examples, Design, and Use › Access Methods for Selected Records › Use Unique Keys to Access Records on the Primary Path

Use Unique Keys to Access Records on the Primary Path

The generated table procedure uses one of two access strategies when it uses unique keys to return a record occurrence for each record type on the primary path:

• Plural Access — If the table procedure receives fewer values than the number of defined unique key fields for a record type, it returns all record occurrences for that record type to the SQL engine for the current owner relationship.
• Unique Access — If the table procedure receives a value for each defined unique key field for a record type, the table procedure returns a single occurrence of that record type to the SQL engine for the current owner relationship.

Note: If you do not define a unique key for a particular record type, the table procedure uses the plural access method for that record type. The data returned to the SQL engine for a particular record occurrence is subject to additional filtering by the SQL engine. See the CA IDMS SQL Reference to determine when values from an SQL statement will be passed to the table procedure for a particular type of query and how SQL engine filtering may affect the resultant table.