Great answer Josh ! On Wed, Apr 13, 2016 at 1:50 AM, <[email protected]> wrote:
> Richard, > > It sounds like you've got a good handle on your data. Before you choose an > engine, I recommend you figure out how you will query it. What are the > questions you are asking of the data? > > If you have particularly graphy questions, such as ones where you focused > on the network of students & exercise (measures of centrality or > influencers) or a variable number of hops, then by all means go with a > graph db and Neo4j is a great engine. > > However, if your questions are fairly simple (what students struggled with > exercise 37, how many more exercises does Johnny have to do?) then I don't > think that the type of db really matters. More important may be what > language you are more comfortable using (SQL vs Cypher). Or you may want to > use it as an excuse to learn a new technology, like graph. > > I find that figuring out how the data is to be queried is more critical > when picking an engine and than the data itself. Also, knowing the > questions you need to answer helps in designing your logical & physical > data model. > > Cheers, > Josh > > On Tuesday, April 12, 2016 at 6:04:29 AM UTC-5, Richard Conrardy wrote: >> >> Hi, >> I am a mathematics teacher and I'd like to store my data in a more >> convenient way than Spreadsheets. >> I'm still not sure what database form to use, graph or relational. >> While I suppose that these forums are biased, I hope to get some good >> ideas. I don't have experience in databases or any query language, but I'm >> willing to invest. >> >> The Main part of the databse would be the marks per student per exercice. >> It would scale up to around 5000 students and 2000 exercices (not every >> student has done every exercice, thus a sparse matrix). >> While this seems to be excellent for spreadsheets, it seems subpar for >> SQL since crosstabs would produce 5000*2000 rows. In Neo4j I have two nodes >> and I link them by Grade with a numeric argument. >> >> The students themselves should contain information like email, but also >> be linked again to classes. >> The Exercices should be linked to class papers and maybe topics with >> propreties such as max marks. As far as I've read I shouldn't include >> binary files into my DB (a shame). >> >> I really like that Neo4j is easy to understand and intuitive. Both (Neo4j >> and SQL) seems easy to get information into and out of (via csv). >> >> I still have some worries about portability. I've got a hosting space >> with an SQL database (over phpmyAdmin) and Neo4j seems to made mainly for >> local use, it's not as easy to install as Joomla (a CMS) for example. >> >> So, what do you think about the situation? Is one sort of database >> clearly better than the other? Should I lean more towards SQL since it has >> more documentation (and is more "standard") or is Neo4j better suited for >> complete beginners? >> >> Thanks in advance >> Richard >> > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "Neo4j" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to [email protected]. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Neo4j" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
