[sockwater]

Originally Posted by Paul M

Correct. There is no need to remove it, and its possible it may be used by other mods.

Every additional index that must be maintained makes inserting and deleting on that table more server-intensive.

IMO, if a product creates something, it should remove it upon uninstallation. However, if the user has another mod installed that also uses the index, it would be detrimental to remove it.

Perhaps there should be a way to track which mods create/use which indexes, so that they can be removed when the last mod that was using them is removed. Here's a brainstorm: Have a way to specify (in a product XML file) the non-vB-default indexes that a mod needs, containing the table, columns and index type. Then upon installation of a mod, vB would automatically create any indexes that don't exist and that the mod needs. When uninstalling, vB would check if the indexes that that mod used are not being used by any other mod, and uninstall them.

Indexes could be treated that way, as opposed to adding tables/columns, since the index is a shared item, and a new table/column for a mod is not a shared item.