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Firstly I apologise for the question it was the only way I could think to ask it in short form.

I have a brief that, under the items table, states: "The store keeps track of the primary supplier of each item (i.e. where they normally buy it from), as well as a secondary supplier. Every item must have a primary supplier, but it is optional to have a secondary supplier." I have interpreted this as the item table has two foreign keys to the supplier table. Given that each item is limited to a maximum of two suppliers and that both foreign keys are in the same record I have stated that the tables have a one (supplier) to many (item) relationship. My logic is based mainly on the programming side of databases and that a many-to-many relationship (to my understanding) would need to be resolved with another table. However, if this is a many-to-many relationship, it is already solved and would not create duplications.

Is it correct to say this or is the relation many to many?

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If the task will stay the same, it is one (supplier) to many (item). If they will change it to something like "each item has a rated list of suppliers", only than it will become many-to-many with junction table (itemId, supplierId, rating).

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