You're really asking a database design question, and it can be answered only by asking more questions.
The first has to be how much do you know about relational databases? The basic theory on normalization, simple queries, etc., covers about 6~10 pages. There are some very good tutorials on the 'Net; search on something like "SQL tutorial" Here are a couple: http://www.cs.unibo.it/~ciaccia/COURSES/RESOURCES/SQLTutorial/sqlcont.htm This deals with MySQL, and gets you to third normal form quite painlessly: http://www.mysql.com/articles/ddws/index.html The next question is "What information do you want from the database?" Write out all the possible questions you will ask of your data. This will tell you what you need to include. When you have this answered, along with some basic table design information, you're in a good position to answer your question. Unfortunately there is no canned answer. Here are a few tips though: For dates, MySQL has a very useful date format. Use it. Most numbers don't have to be stored as a numeric data type, they are more usefully stored as character data. Examples would be phone numbers, street numbers. Numbers which represent quantities, and on which you will do work, multiplying, adding ,dividing, etc., should be stored with a numeric data type. Examples would be price, quantity, number_of_members. MySQL provides an easily used auto-increment field which you can use for a unique primary key on each table. Use it. I know this isn't what you wanted to hear, but I hope it is helpful. The important steps are to determine the possible combinations of data you want to retrieve, and to set up your tables so that you do not needlessly duplicate data, what is otherwise known as third normal form. Will it be somewhat hard work? Yes, but you only have to do it once. I'd also recommend that once you have your "perfect" design, sit down with some people who are somewhat familiar with your problem and have them ask questions about what is stored and how it will be retrieved. Have fun - Miles Thompson At 06:18 PM 1/3/2002 -0500, Viper1 wrote: >I am trying to use the phpmyadmin to create an online resume site. I have >created a table and it seems to be fine but I need some more help on the >next steps also how to test the database out. I started by making a table >called resumes # of fields is 11 first field is name var is 20 and so on. >Can someone please help? Thanks, very much appreciated. -- PHP Database Mailing List (http://www.php.net/) To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To contact the list administrators, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
