Need some help in data design

Hi,
I have been faced with a situation to help design a datamodel for this problem. I am not a very
experience software designer and am looking for any suggestions, advice or leads to help me start this process.
My main experience has been in relational database design and have an elementary knowledge of object oriented systems.

Here is the problem -

The application needs to be able to accept input from users about items they want to be sold using an auction site. The main problem is to be able to acquire all possible attributes about these items since these attributes will be used for making decisions. For eg. We would like to track, all attributes of a product like a watch (manufacturer,model, color etc.).A user can submit any kind of product including services such as consulting services as a product. So we have to come up with a data model to be able to store all the product information for all possible product types. I am somewhat familiar with ER modeling but not by any means an expert and need some advice as to where to start. There are 2 main problems (I am sure there are more) - 1. To be able to model all the product types. One approach could be to create tables (entities) for the major product types such as vehicles,computer hardware, computer software, jewelery etc. and have levels of subtypes for each type of object within these.

2. The other issue is to be able to generate all the possible attributes for all the possible products i.e there might be many products out there, whose attributes I have no idea of. Are any of you aware of any services out there which sell this kind of information.

Any help would be appreciated.

Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
Before you buy. Received on Thu Mar 09 2000 - 00:00:00 CET