LEFT OUTER JOIN will kill you! or “It’s the database, stupid”

I have been doing web programming for about 10 years now… wow it really has been 10 years… and I have worked on a LOT of applications. Large ones, small ones, medium ones. Ones that are screaming fast and ones that are slooooooooooooooooow. Well lately I have been assigned to upkeep a 4 year old [...]