14. A computer readable medium containing program instructions, which when executed by a processor in a computer system causes the processor to perform a method for processing a query to a database in the computer system, wherein the database comprises a table of data and an index correlated to both the query and to the table, the method comprising: receiving the database query; determining whether data responsive to the query has low distinct cardinality; responsive to determining that the data responsive to the query has low distinct cardinality, accessing the index to determine if the table contains a first data entry satisfying a query predicate; and responsive to determining that the fist data entry satisfies the query and prior to determining that a second data entry satisfies the query, scanning substantially the entire table to retrieve substantially all data values satisfying the query.
16. The computer readable medium as claimed in claim 14 , the method further comprising returning a negative response if the table contains no instances of data satisfying the query predicate.