Database design is the process of creating a well-structured and efficient database system that effectively manages and organizes data. It is a collection of processes that facilitate the designing, development, implementation and maintenance of enterprise data management systems. Properly designed database are easy to maintain, improves data consistency and are cost effective in terms of disk storage space. The database designer decides how the data elements correlate and what data must be stored.

It involves designing the database schema, which includes defining the structure, relationships, and constraints of the database.

1. Structured Database System: A database is a structured collection of related data that is organized and stored in a systematic manner. Database design focuses on determining how data should be structured and organized within the database system.
2. Efficient Data Management: Effective database design ensures efficient data management by establishing the appropriate data structures, such as tables, fields, and indexes. It aims to optimize data storage, retrieval, and manipulation operations, leading to improved performance and scalability of the application.
3. Defining the Database Schema: The database schema defines the structure and logical organization of the data in the database. It includes tables, columns, relationships, constraints, and other elements. Database design involves identifying the entities, attributes, and relationships between entities to create a comprehensive and coherent schema.

What is good database design?

Certain principles guide the database design process. The first principle is that duplicate information (also called redundant data) is bad, because it wastes space and increases the likelihood of errors and inconsistencies. The second principle is that the correctness and completeness of information is important. If your database contains incorrect information, any reports that pull information from the database will also contain incorrect information. As a result, any decisions you make that are based on those reports will then be misinformed.

A good database design is, therefore, one that:

• Divides your information into subject-based tables to reduce redundant data.
• Provides Access with the information it requires to join the information in the tables together as needed.
• Helps support and ensure the accuracy and integrity of your information.
• Accommodates your data processing and reporting needs.

The main objectives of database design in DBMS are to produce logical and physical designs models of the proposed database system.

The logical model concentrates on the data requirements and the data to be stored independent of physical considerations. It does not concern itself with how the data will be stored or where it will be stored physically.

The physical data design model involves translating the logical DB design of the database onto physical media using hardware resources and software systems such as database management systems (DBMS).

In conclusion, database design is a critical aspect of application development. It provides the foundation for efficient data management, data integrity, and optimal application performance. By understanding the importance of good database design and its role in application development, developers can create robust, scalable, and user-friendly applications.

Why Database Design is Important ?

It helps produce database systems

1. That meet the requirements of the users
2. Have high performance.

Database design process in DBMS is crucial for high performance database system.

Note, the genius of a database is in its design. Data operations using SQL is relatively simple

Database development life cycle

The database development life cycle has a number of stages that are followed when developing database systems.

The steps in the development life cycle do not necessarily have to be followed religiously in a sequential manner.

On small database systems, the process of database design is usually very simple and does not involve a lot of steps.

In order to fully appreciate the above diagram, let’s look at the individual components listed in each step for overview of design process in DBMS.

Requirements analysis

• Planning – These stages of database design concepts are concerned with planning of entire Database Development Life Cycle. It takes into consideration the Information Systems strategy of the organization.
• System definition – This stage defines the scope and boundaries of the proposed database system.

Database designing

• Logical model – This stage is concerned with developing a database model based on requirements. The entire design is on paper without any physical implementations or specific DBMS considerations.
• Physical model – This stage implements the logical model of the database taking into account the DBMS and physical implementation factors.

Implementation

• Data conversion and loading – this stage of relational databases design is concerned with importing and converting data from the old system into the new database.
• Testing – this stage is concerned with the identification of errors in the newly implemented system. It checks the database against requirement specifications.