Database Design Lifecycle

The database design lifecycle goes something like this:

1. Requirement Analysis

It’s very crucial to understand the requirements of our application so that you can think in productive terms. And imply appropriate integrity constraints to maintain the data integrity & consistency.

2. Logical & Physical Design

This is the actual design phase that involves various steps that are to be taken while designing a database. This phase is further divided into two stages:

• Logical Data Model Design: This phase consists of coming up with a high-level design of our database based on initially gathered requirements to structure & organize our data accordingly. A high-level overview on paper is made of the database without considering the physical level design, this phase proceeds by identifying the kind of data to be stored and what relationship will exist among those data.
  Entity, Key attributes identification & what constraints are to be implemented is the core functionality of this phase. It involves techniques such as Data Modeling to visualize data, normalization to prevent redundancy, etc.
• Physical Design of Data Model: This phase involves the implementation of the logical design made in the previous stage. All the relationships among data and integrity constraints are implemented to maintain consistency & generate the actual database.

3. Data Insertion and testing for various integrity Constraints

Finally, after implementing the physical design of the database, we’re ready to input the data & test our integrity. This phase involves testing our database for its integrity to see if something got left out or, if anything new to add & then integrating it with the desired application.

Database Design can be defined as a set of procedures or collection of tasks involving various steps taken to implement a database. Following are some critical points to keep in mind to achieve a good database design:

1. Data consistency and integrity must be maintained.
2. Low Redundancy
3. Faster searching through indices
4. Security measures should be taken by enforcing various integrity constraints.
5. Data should be stored in fragmented bits of information in the most atomic format possible.

However, depending on specific requirements above criteria might change. But these are the most common things that ensure a good database design.