A candidate key that has been selected as the unique, identifying characteristic for an entity type is called a(n):
A) attribute.
B) identifier.
C) secondary key.
D) gerund.
E) index.

Question

Quizplus · Accepted Answer

A candidate key is a unique identifier for an entity type and is selected as the primary key. Therefore, the answer is identifier (B), as it is the key selected to uniquely identify the entity type. Attributes (A) are characteristics of the entity type, secondary keys (C) are alternate keys that could also identify the entity, and gerunds (D) are verb forms ending in -ing that are not relevant in this context. An index (E) is a data structure used to speed up data retrieval but is not the same as a primary key.

A Candidate Key That Has Been Selected as the Unique