Design Of Computer Features Database
Date: Thu, 30 Nov 2000 10:47:22 -0500
Message-ID: <MPG.149040972b46e5279899a7_at_mayonews.mayo.edu>
Hi,
I am designing a database that I would like to use to track very specific feature-sets for various type of computer items. Periodically, I must gather information to put together in reports for purchasing decisions on hardware. I'd like to have a place to accumulate this info and reuse it easily in a way that minimizes my table count.
For example, any given motherboard has a certain list of specific features out of a set. Examples of these features could be number of serial or parallel ports, which can be open-ended in value, or it could be something like bus speed, which tends to be limited to a smallish set of specific possibilities. As it stands, for the motherboard example, I have seventeen tables to track this item alone. I am afraid of what the db might be like to handle programamtically as I incorporate more types of items. Again, I am trying to see how I might (or might not) be able to reduce table and get a more generic schema that could easily adapt to new items types.
First, some components are used to build others, so I see a Bill- -Materials type model to accomodate that aspect, but I seem to hit a brick wall as to how to have a well-normalized set of tables that tie features into this BOM arrangement.
If anyone has worked on a similar problem, I'd love to hear some suggestions. Thanks.
(Any opinions expressed are stricly mine only and not my employer's)
Paul Tiseo, Intermediate Systems Programmer Birdsall 3, Mayo Clinic Jacksonville
4500 San Pablo Rd, FL, 32224
tiseo.paul_at_mayo.edu -- (904) 953-8254 Received on Thu Nov 30 2000 - 16:47:22 CET