Stage 1 · Lesson 2 of 6
Access patterns: the questions your app asks
An is a question your app asks its data again and again: "get this user by email", "list the last 20 orders for this shop", "search products by name", "total sales per day this month". Write them down before you choose anything, with a rough idea of how often each one runs.
The list tells you a lot. Lookups by one key suit almost any database. Lists filtered and sorted several ways need good .
Questions that combine many kinds of record favour . Questions over millions of rows at once point to analytics tools. A database that answers your top five patterns easily is a good fit, whatever its marketing says.
Common trapdesigning tables from the screens you imagine and discovering the real questions only after launch.
A question to check yourself, an AI practice session and 1 cheat sheet entry come with the full roadmap. Unlock
Resources for this stage
Start with· follow one of these
- CoursePaidGrokking Database Fundamentals for Tech Interviews
Design Gurus · Beginner · Subscription
A structured tour of database types, SQL versus NoSQL, ACID and indexes before you compare products
- CourseFreeCS50's Introduction to Databases with SQL
Harvard University · Beginner
Free Harvard course: the first lectures show how real data is modelled and queried