Database schema design tools...

[scootermaster]

I figure I can either draw it out on my white board, or see what else is out there. Are there any intuitive tools out there? I'm not really any good at DB schema design (see previous thread) so I'm just trying not to mess things up. My idea of design is just to fire up phpmyadmin and add columns until I have what I want in a table.

 

[Drakkon]

DBDesigner4 is my favorite - handles most db types, data types, and pretty intutive provided you know what the symbols mean. also provides reverse engineering to let you take what you have put together in phpmyadmin and see what it would look like diagramed out (requires ODBC connection for mysql)

MySQL also has one out there but its not quiet ready for prime time - but so long as all your doing is simple columns and not too much more your good with that too.

 

[troytime]

i use a whiteboard, but then again, i love whiteboards and am surrounded by them at work and at home

 

[TechBoyJK]

Originally posted by: troytime
i use a whiteboard, but then again, i love whiteboards and am surrounded by them at work and at home

i sometimes print out my schemas on paper, in big text.. then use temp tape to tape them to a whiteboard, then use whiteboard markers to draw out relationships and make notes.

 

[Crusty]

I'll do some high level designs on paper, then usually put it on a whiteboard to finish all the relationships. Most of the columns aren't decided until it's time to start coding. Although if this new project works out for me, I'll be doing some ruby on rails so that might change a bit 🙂

 

[tfinch2]

I used MySQL Workbench in my Databases class this semester and it worked well for what I needed to do.

The largest design I did with it was about 10 tables.

 

[Markbnj]

I use Schemester, MySQL Query Browser, SQL Maestro, and a few other tools. I can also work in script just fine, but I do like editing tabular layouts.