How do you effectively model inheritance in a database?

Question

What are the best practices for modeling inheritance in databases?

What are the trade-offs (e.g. queriability)?

(I\'m most interested in SQL Server and .NET,

Answer 1

Short answer: you don't.

If you need to serialize your objects, use an ORM, or even better something like activerecord or prevaylence.

If you need to store data, store it in a relational manner (being careful about what you are storing, and paying attention to what Jeffrey L Whitledge just said), not one affected by your object design.