You can always put NOT NULL DEFAULT='' everywhere in your schema. If you do use nulls (I use them mostly in foreign keys), it will be good to have the capabili

You can always put NOT NULL DEFAULT='' everywhere in your schema. If you do use nulls (I use them mostly in foreign keys), it will be good to have the capability, but nobody is required to have them. That said, NOT NULL probably should have been the default. It's easy to update the schema to allow nulls if you decide you need them later. You need to make up some data to replace the nulls if you decide to take them out.