Data needs for distributed relational databases

 

The first step in your analysis is to determine which factors affect your data and how they affect it.

Ask yourself the following questions:

• What locations are involved?

• What kind of transactions do you envision?

• What data is needed for each transaction?

• What dependencies do items of data have on each other, especially referential limitations? For example, will information in one table need to be checked against the information in another table? (If so, both tables must be kept at the same location.)

• Does the data currently exist? If so, where is it located? Who "owns" it (that is, who is responsible for maintaining the accuracy of the data)?

• What priority do you place on the availability of the needed data? Integrity of the data across locations? Protection of the data from unauthorized access?

• What access patterns do you envision for the data? For instance, will the data be read, updated, or both? How frequently? Will a typical access return a lot of data or a little data?

• What level of performance do you expect from each transaction? What response time is acceptable?

 

Parent topic:

Identifying your needs and expectations for a distributed relational database