Database Design

Design efficient, maintainable database schemas with safe migration strategies.

Key Principles

• Start from requirements: identify entities, attributes, and relationships first
• Normalize for data integrity, denormalize selectively for read performance
• Design indexes based on actual query patterns, not guesses
• Migrations must be reversible and safe for zero-downtime deployments
• Choose the right ORM — Prisma for type safety, Drizzle for SQL-close, TypeORM for enterprise

Quick Start Checklist

1. Identify entities and relationships from requirements
2. Design normalized schema (3NF minimum)
3. Add indexes for known query patterns
4. Plan migration strategy (up + down)
5. Choose ORM/query builder based on project needs
6. Set up seed data for development

References