Re: Looking for a discussion about generic datamodels

From: David Portas <REMOVE_BEFORE_REPLYING_dportas_at_acm.org>
Date: 2 Sep 2005 04:21:56 -0700
Message-ID: <1125660116.945069.206930@o13g2000cwo.googlegroups.com>

> the choice for such a data model is defended by the
> argumentation that new conceptual tables and columns can be added
> without modification of the data model.

Why would that be an advantage? Is it because your RDBMS* is hard to use or because the developers lack expertise. In that case the obvious solution is to get new software or new staff.

A common excuse for the design you've described is that the business doesn't know or doesn't care to define the data requirements up front and wants a "cheap" way to support metadata that is "user-defined" at some point in the future. The problem is that most of those users will lack the expertise, the time, or the inclination to do a proper job of designing a data model. The user-defined approach therefore costs more in the longer term by reducing the data's validity and usefulness.

(* I'm assuming throughout that we are discussing Relational databases or at least SQL databases, please tell me if I'm wrong)

David Portas Received on Fri Sep 02 2005 - 06:21:56 CDT