[PHP] database design in a survey/poll system
I plan to design a small survey/poll system similar to polldaddyhttp://polldaddy.com/ . And I have some confusion in designing the database for the multiple/single choice questions. Of course, it is possible to use one table to store the question title and another table to store the choice item(one record for each choice item). My main concern is that whether we can place the choices together in the same table(and in one ) with the question title. I guess it can be faster to read from one table than reading from two table. And my idea is to use a delimiter to separate the choices. And the handling of the choices are done in the php script. But what delimiter should be used? Can anyone help? Thanks!
Re: [PHP] database design in a survey/poll system
On Wed, Nov 17, 2010 at 8:42 AM, 肖晗 xiaohan2...@gmail.com wrote: I plan to design a small survey/poll system similar to polldaddyhttp://polldaddy.com/ . And I have some confusion in designing the database for the multiple/single choice questions. Of course, it is possible to use one table to store the question title and another table to store the choice item(one record for each choice item). My main concern is that whether we can place the choices together in the same table(and in one ) with the question title. I guess it can be faster to read from one table than reading from two table. And my idea is to use a delimiter to separate the choices. And the handling of the choices are done in the php script. But what delimiter should be used? Can anyone help? Thanks! When you denormalize like this, it's important to make sure that you don't need to perform more complex queries on the items (sorting, max, min, etc.), as most DB's will outperform PHP for this type of work even if it does require one or more table relationships. That said, when the query needs are simple enough to merit this type of approach, I tend to JSON-encode the data ( http://php.net/manual/en/function.json-encode.php), leaving a simple JSON-decode operation (http://www.php.net/manual/en/function.json-decode.php) to get the queried data back into PHP form. Adam -- Nephtali: PHP web framework that functions beautifully http://nephtaliproject.com
Re: [PHP] database design in a survey/poll system
On Nov 17, 2010, at 7:42 AM, 肖晗 wrote: I plan to design a small survey/poll system similar to polldaddyhttp://polldaddy.com/ . And I have some confusion in designing the database for the multiple/ single choice questions. Of course, it is possible to use one table to store the question title and another table to store the choice item(one record for each choice item). As you have a many-to-one relationship of answers to questions, two tables would be necessary in a normalized database. My main concern is that whether we can place the choices together in the same table(and in one ) with the question title. I guess it can be faster to read from one table than reading from two table. It is possible, but really, why bother? It's not a very time consuming function whether you join two tables or read from one and end up parsing the results. String parsing can be expensive, too. And my idea is to use a delimiter to separate the choices. And the handling of the choices are done in the php script. But what delimiter should be used? You can easily choose any character and just make sure your responses never include that character, or escape it somehow (eg. via \ ) Can anyone help? Thanks! I really don't think you gain much, if anything, by having a single table in this instance. The retrieval is trivial for the sql engine, vs creating parsing code in PHP which may be trouble-prone or convoluted. -- PHP General Mailing List (http://www.php.net/) To unsubscribe, visit: http://www.php.net/unsub.php
[PHP] Database design
Hi all. I know this is not strictly a PHP question but the code will be written in PHP, and I figure the folks here will be well versed in the questions I raise. Please feel free to contact me off the list if appropriate. I need some assistance with database design for a project I'm coding in PHP. I'm willing to pay for the advice, since I think it will be a bit complex. I plan to use MySQLi If anybody feels they can assist, or can point elsewhere please feel free to contact me off list, or reply to the list if you think appropriate. Thanks, Angus
Re: [PHP] Database design
On Thu, Feb 25, 2010 at 03:37:38PM +1000, Angus Mann wrote: Hi all. I know this is not strictly a PHP question but the code will be written in PHP, and I figure the folks here will be well versed in the questions I raise. Please feel free to contact me off the list if appropriate. I need some assistance with database design for a project I'm coding in PHP. I'm willing to pay for the advice, since I think it will be a bit complex. I plan to use MySQLi Not sure why you want to use MySQLi, but I would suggest using PDO functions instead. Either way, I'd design a wrapper class around whatever library you use, to simplify error trapping, make the interface simpler and more orthogonal, and improve portability. I've never understood why they didn't provide such an overall wrapper class for the PDO library. Having three separate PDO classes only complicates the interface to the library. Paul -- Paul M. Foster -- PHP General Mailing List (http://www.php.net/) To unsubscribe, visit: http://www.php.net/unsub.php
Re: [PHP] database design tool
On Feb 12, 2008 7:46 PM, Shawn McKenzie [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Can anyone recommend a preferably visual DB design tool? I normally use mysql, but one that covered several types wood be cool. I'm on Linux, so the new mysql workbench is a dud. I used it in an alpha or prior version and it looked promising but crashed frequently. They say a Linux version in 2008, but I'm not holding my breath. Try DBDesigner4[1], MySQL based their workbench from DBDesigner. However, it won't allow you to connect to MySQL5 and sync your changes, but hey, you're looking for a graphical designer - and this tool is great for designing your DBs. You can install from source and tweak it a bit or you can install the win32 binary and let it run via wine (which works really well). [1] fabforce.net/dbdesigner4/ -- Dax Solomon Umaming http://knightlust.com/ GPG: 0x715C3547 signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part.
Re: [PHP] database design tool
On Feb 12, 2008 7:46 PM, Shawn McKenzie [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
Can anyone recommend a preferably visual DB design tool? I normally use
mysql, but one that covered several types wood be cool. I'm on Linux,
so the new mysql workbench is a dud. I used it in an alpha or prior
version and it looked promising but crashed frequently. They say a
Linux version in 2008, but I'm not holding my breath.
For RAD-style database design, check out OpenOffice.org Base. I
know it comes pre-packaged with Mandriva (which I use), but I'm not
certain about other distros. Depending on your flavor, you can
probably apt-get, yum, urpmi, or manually install from an RPM or DEB.
It works a lot like Filemaker and Access, so if you're familiar
with those, you should notice a lot of similarities. Plus, it will
work without a problem with MyODBC, Unix ODBC, JDBC, and native
connections.
For future reference though, Shawn, try sending to the PHP-DB list
when asking questions like that. Then it's not off-topic. ;-)
--
/Dan
Daniel P. Brown
Senior Unix Geek
? while(1) { $me = $mind--; sleep(86400); } ?
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Re: [PHP] database design tool
Thanks. I use kubuntu and have all ooo including base, but it seems very minimal. I connected via jdbc (as only other option is odbc for mysql). I can't even see how to define a key as auto increment, there is no option. I tried dbdesigner4 and it is very old and buggy on linux. I found a post that suggested I download the windows version and run it under wine. Works great. As for the OT, many apologies, I never even thought of looking for a php-db list, thanks for the heads-up. -Shawn Thanks! -Shawn Daniel Brown wrote: On Feb 12, 2008 7:46 PM, Shawn McKenzie [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Can anyone recommend a preferably visual DB design tool? I normally use mysql, but one that covered several types wood be cool. I'm on Linux, so the new mysql workbench is a dud. I used it in an alpha or prior version and it looked promising but crashed frequently. They say a Linux version in 2008, but I'm not holding my breath. For RAD-style database design, check out OpenOffice.org Base. I know it comes pre-packaged with Mandriva (which I use), but I'm not certain about other distros. Depending on your flavor, you can probably apt-get, yum, urpmi, or manually install from an RPM or DEB. It works a lot like Filemaker and Access, so if you're familiar with those, you should notice a lot of similarities. Plus, it will work without a problem with MyODBC, Unix ODBC, JDBC, and native connections. For future reference though, Shawn, try sending to the PHP-DB list when asking questions like that. Then it's not off-topic. ;-) -- PHP General Mailing List (http://www.php.net/) To unsubscribe, visit: http://www.php.net/unsub.php
[PHP] database design tool
Can anyone recommend a preferably visual DB design tool? I normally use mysql, but one that covered several types wood be cool. I'm on Linux, so the new mysql workbench is a dud. I used it in an alpha or prior version and it looked promising but crashed frequently. They say a Linux version in 2008, but I'm not holding my breath. Thanks! -Shawn -- PHP General Mailing List (http://www.php.net/) To unsubscribe, visit: http://www.php.net/unsub.php
[PHP] Database design/relationship basics book
Does anyone have some recommendations for database books. This is something that I want to get better versed in as I have gotten along by visualizing the database and its relationship for small projects, but I think I need a better base and more knowledge. Recommendations can before both MySQL specific, a query book and a database in general, please I have done database designs for small projects by trial and error and extending original schemas, I would like to learn to do it right the first time. So any suggestions will help. thanks in advance dan __ Do You Yahoo!? Find the one for you at Yahoo! Personals http://personals.yahoo.com -- PHP General 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]
