So there is a thread on the board with table design recommendations and the topic of "first normalized form" was brought up. This reminded me of my db classes where we had to go step by step through all the normalization forms up to a fully normalized set. I failed miserably at this because I could never figure out what the steps were doing. I still, to this day, cannot set a proper normalization step-by-step. I can go from not normalized to normalized in one step, but cant do the in-between stuff. I had learned to normalize on my own and when I was introduced to the in-between stuff, it was like someone telling me there were steps between 1+1 and 2. Thankfully the prof knew what I was doing and gave me credit on our exams when I would just provide the fully normalized design without any steps.

Anyone else have issues with the normalization steps?