SQL SERVER – A Common Design Problem – Should the Primary Key Always be a Clustered Index

In SQL Server, whenever we create any key, a Primary Key automatically creates clustered index on the same. I like this feature and I use this feature every now and then.

The question is does the change of any column as Primary Key should also create a Clustered Index? Moreover, is there any case, where one would not do the same?

One of the recent conversations I had with one SQL Expert is with regard to the SSN number. The discussion was that SSN numbers are always unique and never repeated and hence are the best candidates for primary key. Additionally SSN numbers contains dashes (-), which make the datatype of the SSN numbers as String (VARCHAR or NVARCHAR). A clustered index on an integer usually performs better over a clustered index on an integer and makes the DBA to choose Primary Key of datatype Integer. At one point in our conversation, we discussed that if SSN number should be a Unique Constraint and if there should be another Identity Column as the Primary Key.

Some of the questions from our interesting discussion are as follows:

Would you have the datatype of your Primary Key as string?
Would you treat SSN as string datatype or remove the dashes and change it into an integer?
Do you have a real life example, where your primary key is not a clustered index?
What are the best practices for SSN number to store in database and obtain optimal performance?

I will post an interesting answer discussing this subject in a separate post with due credit.

Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com)