With nulls in join keys: INNER excludes null keys (no match). LEFT: keeps left rows, null for right when no match or when key is null. RIGHT: mirror of LEFT. Test: create small tables with 0, NULL, 1; run each join; observe. Use COALESCE in ON to normalize: ON COALESCE(a.key,-1)=COALESCE(b.key,-1). **Why it matters**: Design choices compound at scale—wrong approach can cause 100× overhead. **Scalability trade-offs**: Profile before optimizing; validate on sample then full....
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