How to avoid two capture tasks when capturing one entity.

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DataTable

normalization

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I am busy with a web page that allows the user to capture a new Appointment, represented by this table:

CREATE TABLE [Appointment](
    [Id] [int] IDENTITY(1,1) NOT NULL,
    [ClientName] [nvarchar](100) NOT NULL,
    [ClientId] [int] NULL,
    [DateTime] [smalldatetime] NOT NULL,
    [Hours] [int] NULL,
    [Subject] [nvarchar](100) NULL
) ON [PRIMARY]

The reason I have column ClientName is to make the capture process for a new appointment as quick and smooth as possible, even for a client that does not yet exist. If I had a non-nullable ClientId, the user would have to create a new client before continuing.

Then, the app should run a task to identify appointments with null ClientId values, and prompt the user into either capturing a new client, or assigning the correct existing client to the appointment.

Am I barking up the wrong tree here with this approach, and if so, what would you recommend?