I am currently storing normalized versions of strings in my SQL Server database in lower case. For example, in my Users table, I have a UserName and a LoweredUserName field. Depending on the context, I either use T-SQL’s LOWER() function or C#’s String.ToLower() method to generate the lower case version of the user name to fill the LoweredUserName field. According to Microsoft’s guidelines and Visual Studio’s code analysis rule CA1308, I should be using C#’s String.ToUpperInvariant() instead of ToLower(). According to Microsoft, this is both a performance and globalization issue: converting to upper case is safe, while converting to lower case can cause a loss of information (for example, the Turkish ‘I’ problem).
If I move to using ToUpperInvariant for string normalization, I will have to change my database schema as well, since my schema is based on Microsoft’s ASP.NET Membership framework (see this related question), which normalizes strings to lower case.
Isn’t Microsoft contradicting itself by telling us to use upper case normalization in C#, while it’s own code in the Membership tables and procedures is using lower case normalization? Should I switch everything to upper case normalization, or just continue using lower case normalization?
To answer your first question, yes Microsoft is a bit inconsistent. To answer your second question, no do not switch anything until you have confirmed that this is causing a bottleneck in your application.
Think how much forward progress you can make on you project instead of wasting time switching everything. Your development time is much more valuable than the savings you would get from such a change.
Remember: