GeoNames Forum

Hi,

I was wondering why the featureCodes database has a multi-part field for the codes? Why are the class and code not separated into different fields? I see that there is a code "null" that does not appear at all in the geonames table. I'd appreciate a description of the logic. Thanks.

You can store it in you database as you like depending on your needs. Normally it is not a good idea to fully normalize a database, but this is up to you and depends on your requirements and what you want to achieve.
A feature code of 'null' means that it is not known.

Best

Marc

Merci Marc, I wanted to separate the feature class from the feature code, which are joined in a single field in the featureCodes.txt table, as well as removing the "null" in that table because it doesn't appear in the other tables. Will this cause troubles in future updates of the source database? Thanks.

'null' is the database null, not the value 'null'.
The featureCodes.txt file is just a file. In the geonames database there is no such table.

Best

Marc