Database Schema Design Guide: Rules & Best Practices

摘要： If your end goal is to build a high-performance and scalable application, you need to have a good database design. Everything begins with the database and a badly designed one is like having a bad foundation on your house. No matter how many quality elements you add to it, it won’t matter.

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One of the most important things you need to do when designing your database is to find a good database schema example that will show you all the important elements of a reliable database. Apart from that, you can search for tips and rules that will take you to a better design, and that is exactly what this guide list is here for.

Choose the type of database you want

When it comes to different types of databases, there are some specific ones appropriate for certain projects that are more complicated. However, for most projects, people usually choose between SQL and NoSQL.

SQL database is the standard for structured data and it’s the go-to choice for those who put data integrity above all else. As for the NoSQL database, it’s required for emerging technology to demand speed and scalability, which is just one of the reasons why NoSQL is the future of IoT.

Either way, if you know what you want from your database, it will be easy for you to choose between one of these two types. And when you’re making your choice, it’s also important to think about your business’ long-term needs.

A well-designed database needs to be scalable and to keep working even when there is a high workload and increased usage. So if you are looking to scale your business and increase your workload, you have to factor that during the database design process.

Think about privacy

In today’s modern world, privacy concerns keep growing among internet users, as the number of hackers keeps increasing. Damage related to cybercrime is projected to hit $10.5 trillion annually by 2025, so if you want to keep your business, customers, and money, you need to think about security.

But this isn’t the only reason why privacy needs to be a primary concern for you, since all companies within the EU and those who do business with EU companies need to comply with the GDPR. And if you want to be GDPR compliant, you need to follow certain rules.

Some of the things you should do is to ensure all passwords used in your company are encrypted, provide your administrators with privacy training, and ensure they all have well-documented qualifications. Another way you can keep your data safe is to use a different server for the database than your application.

Don’t take database modeling and design for granted

A common mistake among developers is ignoring the modeling and design of the database. They usually skip this step because it’s time-consuming and requires a lot of time and effort and instead put most of their focus into the different aspects of the software development process.

While software development is essential, if you want a good database, you need to invest your time and effort into modeling and design. After all, good design is what ensures the functionality of an application.

And don’t think that if you skip this step, you will save yourself time. A database with poor design and modeling will require a lot more maintenance and redesigning down the line.

Create and use stored procedures

Stored procedures are prepared codes that you can use when you need to manipulate your data quickly and hassle-free. However, very few people use stored procedures and if you make the same mistake, you’ll make some tasks much harder for yourself than they need to be.

Let’s say for instance that you use one SQL query very often and you don’t want to spend time writing the same code over and over again, you can code that query into a stored procedure. And every time you need that query, all you need to do is execute the procedure and you’re good to go.

It’s undoubtedly going to be a tiring job, but when you code all of the stored procedures your database needs, you’ll make it much easier for end-users of the database.

轉貼自： bigdataanalyticsnews.com

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