I need to track permissions and access requests to a file server in a database. I’m given the full path of the folder and am considering parsing the path (splitting on the “/” character) and creating a self-referential link to the table… in addition to a column intended to store the full file path.

What is the ideal approach for dealing with such a system that can have a tree of folders and having a database schema suited for that purpose?

Is self-referential columns overkill?