Which is more important? DB design or coding? [closed]

Answer 1

Design if you're a DBM.

Coding if you're a programmer.

These aren't mutually exclusive and should both be well executed.

Answer 2

Both are important of course, it's a symbiotic relationship.

But if your DB is jacked, no amount of good code can make your app shine.

However, if your DB is really good, then good code can make it even better (but bad code can still ruin it).

Answer 3

Paraphrasing Knuth -

It is far more important to use an efficient data structure. A bad structure will slow down your application regardless of your algorithm and a good structure can even eliminate the need for certain algorithms.

I think that this applies equally to DBs. You are ultimately building a massively linked data structure. If you don't use the right methods, your application will be slow, regardless of how much trickery you put into it.

Answer 4

They are not mutually exclusive. Both must be rock solid to have a chance at a rock solid solution.

Answer 5

IMHO Good database design in more important then good coding (good coding is also important but compare to database design).

1. Simply because Database will store your valuable data.
2. Bad coding may not affect the database but will affect the scalability, performance of the whole application, etc. Over a period of time this can be fixed by refactoring(ofcourse some cost involved).
3. Refactoring a database is much more costlier and difficult.
4. Also normally we have multiple different apps running on same database so its a common factor.

Answer 6

I can see I'm going to be swimming upstream, but I'm pretty strongly biased toward software being the answer to your question.

While your software can adapt to a weak schema, there's not much your database can help you with if your software is disfunctional. I've had a couple cases where I've been able to take a popular front-end application and totally rebuild the database without serious disruption, because the users don't see the database directly. (Which won't be true if the software is crap.)

So I'd say pay attention to what's closest to the user first.