title: Best approach for storing forum threads and replies in a database
body: <p>A forum seems to be an interesting project in terms of schema design.</p>
  
  <p>I was wondering, to get a recordset consisting of an opening thread and replies, what is the best way? I could store all threads (the first, opening post) in a table and have a table with replies. I could then use the appropriate join to get all the replies in the reply table which match with the thread (e.g. unique key match between pk/fk). I could then sort this table based on data of replies to get the start to last post. Would this be a view or temporary table? And why?</p>
  
  <p>Alternatively, I could store everything in one table and use recursion to get the data back. This is a little more complex?</p>
  
  <p>What is the best approach? Or perhaps there is a better way then both of these?</p>
  
  <p>Thanks </p>