Make friends with Relationships

Empower yourself by understanding relationships within a database. While they may seem complex at first, relationships are the key to reducing data duplication. Despite common phrases like “In relation to,” relationships don’t have a direct real-world equivalent. But once you grasp their function, you’ll feel more in control of your data.

Relationships are the backbone of efficient data management. They ensure that if a value is “X,” it must correspond to “Y.” For example, if a product is labelled as X, its category must always be “Y.” This structured approach to data is what makes relationships so powerful, allowing us to avoid the pitfalls of a single table (Flat File). By using relationships, we can minimize the risk of storing invalid data and streamline our processes.

Consider a scenario where every time you made a purchase from an online store, you had to manually enter all the information instead of simply choosing a product. Would the overall quality of the stored data be the same? We would likely make mistakes such as typing values incorrectly or assigning them to the wrong categories. This is precisely why dropdowns, which capture predefined relationships, are so crucial.

To illustrate, a dropdown essentially enables the repeated entry of the same value into a column. Expanding on this concept, if a dropdown allows users to select a product that belongs to a sub-category and category, this linked data is readily available through the dropdown selection process.

Looking at this from a different angle, the expanded dropdown essentially functions as a table, specifically a dimension table. As we extract hierarchical and repetitive data elements from our original table, we ultimately form a fact table and multiple dimensions, resembling a Star Schema. Recognising this, we can start contemplating how best to construct our analytical models.

Geordie Consulting is a business intelligence and analytics company that helps clients across multiple sectors leverage their data and gain insights. It offers services such as data warehousing, data integration, data visualisation, dashboard development, reporting, and predictive analytics. We have a team of experienced and certified consultants who use the latest tools and technologies to deliver solutions that meet the client’s needs and expectations. Geordie Consulting is your trusted partner for help achieving your goals and objectives through data-driven decisions.