10 WAYS

TO WRECK YOUR

DATABASE
Josh Berkus PostgreSQL Experts, Inc. For O'Reilly Media, July 2009

against your boss

REVENGE

guarantee yourself

JOB SECURITY

ensure PROJECT

FAILURE

make sure

NOBODY KNOWS

THE REAL DATA

open a database

BACK
DOOR

force a

REWRITE
of the code

TOTAL

SLOW
DOWN
the application

to a crawl

make those stupid

DEVELOPERS

MISERABLE

10 Ways
to:

Lose Data
Be Insecure
Become Unmaintainable

Stife Changes
and

Make Everyone

Miserable

One Big Spreadsheet

2. ranDom_naming(s) plural vs. singular

users forum threads posts message

profle styles images survey faqs

2. ranDom_naming(s) camel vs. underscore

users threadCategory threads posts privateMessage

userProfle user_styles post_images survey faqs

2. ranDom_naming(s) felds

users

users

frstName last_name login email crt_date lstLogin

is_active ACL

2. ranDom_naming(s) Hungarian Notation

tblUsers

tblUsers

txtFirstName str_last_name txtLogin email dtcrt_date tmslstLogin

bool_is_active int4ACL

3&4 We don't need no stinking keys

3. No Real Keys

Users

userID AUTONUMBER PRIMARY KEY frst_name last_name login email is_active

3. No Real Keys
ID
21 47 198 204

first_name last_name
Josh Joshua Josh Josh Berkus Berkus Berkus Berkus

email

login password active level

jehosaphat dbguy jehosaphat joshiam TRUE TRUE FALSE TRUE u u u a

josh@pgexperts.com josh josh@pgexperts.com joshb josh@postgresql.org joshb josh@agliodbs.com jberkus

4. No Foreign Keys
users.login Josh Berkus jberkus jerkyboy selena posts.content Josh Berkus What's up? I'm going crazy! www.pornking.com Why? www.whitehouse.com OSCON! It's too much! www.whiteslavery.com www.lolcats.com I told you so ...

4. Fun with Orphan Rows

users.login Josh Berkus jberkus selena posts.content Josh Berkus What's up? I'm going crazy! Why? www.whitehouse.com OSCON! It's too much! www.lolcats.com I told you so ...

4. Fun With Updates

INSERT INTO threads VALUES ( .... ); if $dbh('success') then while $these_posts.date > $cutdate UPDATE posts SET thread = $newthread WHERE id = $these_posts.id; if not $dbh('success') then while $these_posts.id > $last_id UPDATE posts SET thread = $oldthread WHERE id = $these_posts.id; DELETE FROM threads WHERE id = $newthread;

5. No Constraints

Users

userID AUTONUMBER PRIMARY KEY frst_name TEXT last_name TEXT login TEXT email TEXT is_active TEXT

5. No Constraints

Users

userID AUTONUMBER PRIMARY KEY frst_name VARCHAR (30) last_name VARCHAR (30) login VARCHAR (20) email VARCHAR (40) is_active BOOLEAN

5. No Constraints
first_name
Josh NULL Mike S

last_name
Berkus NULL Hunt F

email
josh@pgexperts.com kelley@ucb www.pornking.com gavin@sf.gov

login
jberkus k c34521 gavin

password active
jehosaphat NULL c34521 twitter TRUE FALSE TRUE NULL

level
a u I x

6. Non-Atomic Fields
name Josh Berkus SELECT SUBSTR(name,STRPOS(name, ' ')) ... status a WHERE status = 'a' OR status = 'u' ...

6. Non-Atomic Fields
name Josh Berkus SELECT SUBSTR(name,STRPOS(name, ' ')) ... status i WHERE status = ??? ...

6. Non-Atomic Fields

Account Type

5400 active individual 5401 inactive individual 5600 active board individual 5601 inactive board individual 6600 active corporate donor 6601 active corporate board member 6602 inactive corporate donor 6603 inactive corporate board member

7. Magic Numbers

ID = 0

7. Magic Numbers

ID = 0
SELECT case_file, count(1) FROM case_events WHERE ID > 0 AND scheduled = TRUE GROUP BY case_file;

7. Magic Numbers

2008-02-30

7. Magic Numbers

2008-02-30
SELECT user_id, min(date) FROM user_posts WHERE NOT ( extract(month from date) = 2 and extract (day from date) = 30 ) GROUP BY user_id;

7. Magic Numbers

-1, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 100

7. Magic Numbers

-1, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 100
SELECT household, avg(headcount) FROM house WHERE headcount BETWEEN 0 and 99 GROUP BY household;

7. Magic Numbers

$-0.01

7. Magic Numbers

$-0.01
SELECT * FROM invoices WHERE total <> $0.01 AND sent_on IS NULL;

7. Magic Numbers

Document them only in your code!

8. Polymorphic Fields
Name
Josh Berkus John Dillinger Pearson Clorox

AccountType PrefContact
Individual Board Company Company Email Phone NULL Jackie

ContactInfo
josh@pgexperts.com 415-555-1212 www.pearson.com 510-555-1111 x202

9. EAV (entity-attribute-value)
ID 407 407 407 408 408 408 409 Property Eyes Height Married? Married? Smoker Age Height Setting Brown 73in TRUE FALSE FALSE 37 66in

9. EAV (entity-attribute-value)

Diffcult tasks:

Find out how many men have brown hair and are over 6 feet? Make marital status and age required, but not other things. Apply constraints to feld values.

9. EAV 2.0: E-BLOB

ID Properties

407

<eyes=brown><height=73> <married=1><smoker=1> <hair=brown><age=49> <married=0><smoker=0> <age=37><height=66> <hat=old><teeth=gold>

408

409

10. Let The ORM Take Care Of It

The Ten Ways

1.one big spreadsheet 2.random naming 3.no keys 4.no foreign keys 5.no constraints 6.non-atomic felds 7.magic numbers 8.polymorphic felds 9.EAV & EBlob 10.ORM

Ten Ways to Fix Your Database

1.normalization 2.consistent naming 3.keys 4.foreign keys 5.constraints 6.atomic felds 7.atomic felds 8.atomic felds 9.limit EAV & EBlob 10.DB design

More Wreckage

Simplifying Database Design Tutorial

OSCON, Monday 8:30 AM Before OSCON, Sunday 19th, all day wiki.postgresql.org/wiki/PgDaySanJose2009 PostgreSQL Experts: www.pgexperts.com blog: it.toolbox.com/blogs/database-soup email: josh@pgexperts.com
This presentation copyright 2009 Josh Berkus, licensed for distribution under the Creative Commons Attribution License.

PostgreSQL Day San Jose

Me