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Asked: 2026-05-11T16:58:22+00:00

I have a table which has two varchar(Max) columns Column 1 Column 2 ———————–

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I have a table which has two varchar(Max) columns

Column 1      Column 2
-----------------------
URLRewitten   OriginalURL

its part of my url re-writing for an asp.net webforms site.

when a url comes in I do a check to see if its in the table if it is i use the OriginalURL.

My question is, if all I’m doing is querying the table for urls and no other table in the database will ever link to this table does it need a dedicated primary key field? like an auto-number? will this make queries faster?

and also how can I make the query’s run as faster?

Edit: I do have a unique constraint on URLRewitten.

Edit: ways i’m using this table..

  • Query when a new Request comes in.. search on URLRewitten to find OriginalURL
  • When needing to display a link on the site, i query on the OriginalURL to find the URLRewitten url i should use.
  • When adding a new url to the table i make sure that it doesn’t already exist.

thats all the querys i do.. at the moment.

Both columns together would be unique.

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1 Answer

  1. Editorial Team

    Do you need a primary key? Yes. Always. However, it looks like in your case OriginalURL could be your primary key (I’m assuming that there wouldn’t be more than one value for URLRewritten for a given value in OriginalURL).

    This is what’s known as a “natural key” (where a component of the data itself is, by its nature, unique). These can be convenient, though I have found that they’re generally more trouble than they’re worth under most circumstances, so yes, I would recommend some sort of opaque key (meaning a key that has no relation to the data in the row, other than to identify a single row). Whether or not you want an autonumber is up to you. It’s certainly convenient, though identity columns come with their own set of advantages and disadvantages.

    For now I suppose I would advise creating two things:

    1. A primary key on your table of an identity column
    2. A unique constraint on OriginalURL to enforce data integrity.
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