Vertabelo Database Modeler

Design patterns

Flexible and Manageable Bill of Materials (BOM) Designs

by Jean-Marc Reynaud

30 Jun 2016 The bill of materials design pattern is deceptively simple, yet incredibly powerful. This article will introduce an example, familiar to IT professionals, that you may not have thought fits the BOM pattern. It will also introduce concepts to show you how to make your BOM structures more flexible and much easier to manage. A Short Recap of the BOM A bill of materials has its roots in manufacturing. It is a list of the raw materials, sub-assemblies, intermediate assemblies, sub-components, parts, and the quantities of each needed to manufacture an end product.

Design patterns

Identifying the Bill of Materials (BOM) Structure in Databases

by Jean-Marc Reynaud

9 Jun 2016 The bill of materials (BOM) design pattern is deceptively simple, yet incredibly powerful. Historically, it’s been employed to model product structures, but the pattern can be used to do much more than simply define a hierarchy. This article will introduce three very different examples to help you to recognize the pattern in your own projects. What Is a Bill of Materials, or BOM? A bill of materials has its roots in manufacturing.

Design patterns

Beverly Hills 90210 and ZIP+4: Handling Addresses in Data Models

by Jeffrey Edison

2 Jun 2016 In my last post, I wrote about ensuring that your data model properly handles global information: numbers, currencies, phone numbers, addresses, dates, and time zones, among other things. However, I’ve realized that many example data models have exactly the “self-centric” or “Amero-centric” approach that I cautioned against. As an American living abroad (for almost 30 years now), I often find that people make too many assumptions about the universality of what they know.

Design patterns

Merging Multiple User Accounts

by Patrycja Dybka

24 May 2016 Social media surrounds us, so it’s not unusual for applications to require some kind of social media integration. The most common issigning in with Facebook, Twitter, or another service. Users expect to be able to log in with different social accounts. So, applications meet these expectations by offering external login options. Let’s take a look at this functionality and investigate how to merge users’ accounts – specifically, we’ll consider the situation when people use several methods to log in.

Design patterns

7 Key Things to Remember About Data Model Globalization

by Jeffrey Edison

12 May 2016 Very few database authors mention the challenges of globalization and localization in any meaningful way. There’s a similar lack of foresight from database architects. The fact is that many authors and designers are frequently very ‘self-centric’: they create (or write about) data models that only properly handle their local time zones, addresses, etc. A self-centric approach has a big problem: the resulting model will only support local data. In today’s Internet-fueled world, applications are often unexpectedly accessed by users around the globe.

Design patterns

Star Schema vs. Snowflake Schema

by Emil Drkušić

28 Apr 2016 In the previous two articles, we considered the two most common data warehouse models: the star schema and the snowflake schema. Today, we’ll examine the differences between these two schemas and we’ll explain when it’s better to use one or the other. The star schema and the snowflake schema are ways to organize data marts or entire data warehouses using relational databases. Both of them use dimension tables to describe data aggregated in a fact table.

Design patterns

How to Design a Localization-Ready System

by Shantanu Kher

26 Apr 2016 In this era of globalization, companies – including software developers – are always interested in expanding to new markets. This often means localizing their products for different areas. In this article, we’ll explain a few approaches to designing your data model for localization – specifically, for managing content in multiple languages. What Is Localization? Localization is the process of adapting a product to various markets. It is a prominent factor in achieving maximum market share in terms of product sales.

Design patterns

The Snowflake Schema

by Emil Drkušić

21 Apr 2016 In a previous article we discussed the star schema model. The snowflake schema is next to the star schema in terms of its importance in data warehouse modeling. It was developed out of the star schema, and it offers some advantages over its predecessor. But these advantages come at a cost. In this article, we’ll discuss when and how to use the snowflake schema. The Snowflake Schema if (typeof VertabeloEmbededObject === 'undefined') {var VertabeloEmbededObject = "

Design patterns

Security Approaches in Data Modeling. Part 4

by Andrew Wolfe

20 Apr 2016 This is the fourth in our multi–part series on data modeling for information security as well as data characteristics. A simple data model for a fictional website that supports shared–interest organizations (bird–watching clubs, etc.) has provided us with content for exploring data modeling from a security viewpoint. In Oscar Wilde’s play Lady Windermere’s Fan, Lord Darlington tags a cynic as “somebody who knows the price of everything, and the value of nothing.

Design patterns

The Star Schema

by Emil Drkušić

14 Apr 2016 Today, reports and analytics are almost as important as core business. Reports can be built out of your live data; often this approach will do the trick for small- and medium-sized companies without lots of data. But when things get bigger – or the amount of data starts increasing dramatically – it’s time to think about separating your operational and reporting systems. Before we tackle basic data modeling, we need some background on the systems involved.

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