Naming convention for automated table outputs (processed with Python)

Question

I have several tables that I process nightly with Python.

For example, I have read-only access to an incidents table. I process the table with a specialized Python library called ArcPy. The script has a number of steps, including calculating the Minimum Bounding Geometry (a.k.a. convex hull) of like-incidents. The script processes the incidents table nightly and outputs the results to a new table.

I would like to follow database conventions and industry practices when outputting these tables, where possible. Having a distinct naming convention would allow me to easily identify master tables from output tables.

Is there a naming convention for automated table outputs (processed with python, or otherwise) that I should be using?

Answer 1

I dont think there are any hard rules around this. It's really up to you to decide what convention suits you best.

The options available to you may be influenced by the database software you are using.

The 3 suggestions i have are:

1. Use a different schema i.e [Processed] and keep the table name the same.
2. Add a prefix so that all processed tables appear together.
3. Add a suffix to the table name. So that when you sort by name the original and processed appear together.

The 2nd and 3rd option make more sense if you spend more time working with tables as groups or with original and processed as a pair.