Help with a One to Many relationship

[ByronSmith3]

Hello all! New here, self-learning database design and applying what I learn with Access. I believe I have a good understanding of Relationships, however, I am having problems with a one to many relationship I created. I have a table, named 'Names_Info' (the child) and another named 'Business_Info' (the parent). Names_Info has a foreign key labeled 'Business_ID' and is linked to the primary key of the parent table. If I attempt to create a record in the 'Names_Info' table, which is the parent table to a few other tables, it won't let me create the record if the record is not associated with a business record. I can understand why this is, but in a real database solution situation, the name record might not have a business association if, say, the person was unemployed. I have read that the FK may be or may not be Null (and I have it as not required in the 'Names_Info ' table), so how do I do this? I know if I create a many to many relationship I can solve this, but I'm trying to learn without creating that type of relationship. Thanks!

[orange]

If Names_Info is the child of Business_Info, and there is no Business_Info record for that child, it seems you have an illogical set up.

Consider Parent and Child in the traditional family set up. You can't really have a Child without a Parent---which is the situation you described.
Perhaps you could tell us more of your situation.

[ByronSmith3]

The parent / child relationship you described is the part that I understand as to why I am having the issue, but I thought that I have read somewhere that a foreign key in a one to many relationship may be null, and may not be null. To describe what I am doing: I am building a Customer Relationship Management tool as a learning tool for myself as I learn database design, SQL, etc. I have designed the database using an ERD, and now I am trying to put it to use. In this database, Names of people could be customers (stored in the 'Names_Info' table, and businesses could be customers (stored in the 'Business_Info' table). However, Names can also work for a business, be a contact or decision maker of the business, etc. In my design, a business can be related to many names, but each name record in the 'Names_Info' table can only be related to one business. But what if a name who is a potential customer is unemployed, a homemaker, or I don't have the name of the business that they work for information? As stated above, if I keep this field blank, I cannot create the record in the 'Names_Info' table. I could create a record in the 'Business_Info' table that states 'Unknown' and/or 'Unemployed', etc., but I believe that this will give me problems in the future. 'Names_Info' primary key is 'Names_ID', and the 'Business_Info' table uses 'Business_ID' as its primary key. 'Business_ID' is the foreign key in the 'Names_Info' table. I hope that this is enough information.

[ByronSmith3]

I think I might have figured it out. If I remove referential integrity in this relationship, I should be able to create the name record without the business record. But I should sit down and review my design before doing this to ensure it won't create any issues later on. Does that sound correct, though?

[orange]

Please post a copy of your ERD. It's good that you have an example and are working to learn by doing.

I don't understand the "business" at this point. You mention Customers but haven't mentioned a customer table. Names don't work in a Business -- I think it would be People or Person. I don't know how you have determined a sort of leveling --I'm not following unemployed and homemaker
in the same theme?? Customer vs potential Customer..

You may get some ideas here.