Primary keys

In the Oracle Endeca Server data model, primary keys (also known as record specs) are used to uniquely identify records.

Each record must have an assignment from exactly one primary-key attribute, so that the Oracle Endeca Server can uniquely identify it. The PDR (Property Description Record) for the primary-key attribute must have the mdex-property_IsUnique attribute set to true. This means that a value may be assigned to at most one record.

This requirement is enforced when you are adding initial records to the Endeca data domain using the Data Ingest Web Service or the Bulk Ingest interface. If you add a new record to the Oracle Endeca Server, it verifies that the record has an assignment for exactly one value from the primary-key attribute.

For more information on how the primary key is used when new records are added to the data domain, see the Oracle Endeca Server Data Loading Guide.

You can use any attribute as a primary key as long as the attribute is single-assign and guaranteed to be unique. An attribute is unique when no two records in a single Endeca data domain have the same value for it. Note that by default, a standard attribute is not unique. To make a standard attribute unique, you must update the standard attribute configuration before loading any records. The configuration of a standard attribute is defined by the PDR.