...and master of none

In the beginning, Codd proposed Third Normal Form , and it was good. Today, we need something better... Relational databases are great. They provide a robust and scalable representation of data in a way that people easily understand, and can manipulate with a minimum of training. However, the usefulness of that data is only as valuable as how the data is modeled. In this post, the "three keys pattern" for entity design will be presented. We will attempt to show how it allows relational databases to continue to scale horizontally and vertically for the internet age while retaining the simple query characteristics that are so appealing. Model Complete Entities, not Tables Much of the data we model is hierarchal in nature: parent-child, master-detail, and so forth... When this data is modeled in a database, the levels of the hierarchy are split, and the relationships described. Other data represents the edges between primary entities: uses of, instances of, etc... These...