Ax2012 Table Keys.

We are going to see the concept of keys on Tables in Ax2012.
These all following keys that we are going though appears in the AOT Table properties window.

Primary Key
The primary key is usually the type of key that other tables, called child tables, refer to when a foreign key field in those other tables need a relational identifier.
When we create a new table in AX2012 the Primary key was enforced by an index that has one field, this field should be unique, by default the primary key is based on Recid field. This is represented as surrogateKey in the table properties primary index.
By default the CreateRecIdIndex property was true and ClusterIndex as surrogateKey.


The ClusterIndex value is given to the underlying Microsoft SQL Server database system as a performance tuning choice. This choice generally controls the physical sequence in which the records are stored in the underlying database.


ReplacementKey
This key is used to define the replacement fields to display in your design when you referred  to some relation using the Recid.
for ex:-
Table B is referring to Table A where the TableB have the Refrecid from Table A, but when you open the form for TableB We cant show the Recid of the TableA in the Presentation,So whatever the field that you want to display, you will define one index on TableA with the fields that you want to show and and index alternateKey property to Yes. define the Replacement key property for the table A as this index.


If a ReplacementKey is chosen, its fields can appear on forms to helpfully identify each record.The ReplacementKey should be a set of fields that represent the natural key.


In AX2012 Relation represents a foreign key.


In Ax2012 we will use different Terms that used to describe the keys, These terms we wont see anywhere in AX physically in property names.


Foriegn Key-In Microsoft Dynamics AX, an AOT node under MyTable > Relations represents a foreign key. 
natural key-A key whose value has meaning to people. Most replacement keys are natural keys.(ReplacementKey).
unique key-this applies to primary keys and to alternate keys. It does not apply to foreign keys. This term emphasizes that all values for a given key must be unique within one table. All fields in a unique key must be not-nullable.