Approach to Database Design (Including ERD)

Importance of database design

• Crucial to the success of a project
• Contributes to:
  • Integrity of data
  • Reduction of redundancy
  • Performance
  • User satisfaction
• Avoids costly problems

Database design process

1. Requirements analysis: analyse the data you are working with and the requirements for the use of that data
2. Logical design: plan how to organise your data
3. Physical design: plan how to implement your logical design in the database management system you will be using

Requirements analysis

• Need to identify the base objects in the data and the relationships between these objects
• How you obtain the information: Reviewing any existing stores of this data, be that in a database, other electronic format, or even a paper-based system.

Logical design

• Take the requirements you identified in the analysis stage and map them to entities, attributes, and relationships
• Logical models should not specify any technical requirements, so should not be thinking about any implementation considerations at this stage
• Generally entities are people, events, locations, or things
• The characteristics of the objects will become attributes
• Should also think about the attributes of your entities

Physical design

• How your database will look
• Impact of database management system:
  • Data types
  • Naming rules
  • Indexes
  • Constraints

Hands-on Lab: Database Design using ERDs

Hands-on Lab: Final Project