Apologies if this is really stupid but I don't have any experience in php and mysql to know how things should be done. I have a customer table in a mysql db and a group table:
customers - ID name email phone group
groups - ID name description
So I need to assign groups to customers if necessary, this can be more than one group to each customer. So e.g. customer 1 is in group 4,5,6
What way should I assign groups in the group column of the customer table. Should I just add the group ID's separated by commas, then just use explode when I need to get the individual ID's out?
Maybe this isn't the right approach at all, could someone enlighten me please. I would appreciate knowing the right way to do this, thanks.
Do not store multiple IDs in one column. This is a denormalization that will make it much harder to query and change your data, as well as hurting performance.
Instead, create a separate CustomerGroup table (with CustomerID and GroupID columns), and have one row per Customer/Group relationship.
Here is an example of tables to show how you should implement this :
Table 1 CONSUMERS:
id name email
1 john john#something.com
2 ray ray#something.com
Table 2 GROUPS :
id group_name description
1 music good music group
2 programming programmers
Table 3 CONSUMERS_GROUPS
consumer_id group_id
1 1
1 2
2 1
Now the table 3 is listing consumers ids which belong to which group id.
This type of relationship is called one to many relation where, one consumer can have many groups. Reverse might also be true where one group can have many consumers. In that case relationship is called many to many
Should I just add the group ID's separated by commas, then just use explode when I need to get the individual ID's out?
No! If you do that then you won't quickly be able to (for example) query for which users there are in a specific group.
Instead use a join table with two columns, each of which has a foriegn key constraint to the corresponding table.
group_id customer_id
4 1
5 1
6 1
Related
I need to summary columns together on each row, like a leaderboard. How it looks:
Name | country | track 1 | track 2 | track 3 | Total
John ENG 32 56 24
Peter POL 45 43 35
Two issues here, I could use the
update 'table' set Total = track 1 + track 2 + track 3
BUT it's not always 3 tracks, anywhere from 3 to 20.
Secound if I don't SUM it in mysql I can not sort it when I present data in HTML/php.
Or is there some other smart way to build leaderboards?
You need to redesign your table to have colums for name, country, track number and data Then instead if having a wide table with just 3 track numbers you have a tall, thin table with each row being the data for a given name, country and track.
Then you can summarise using something like
SELECT
country,
name,
sum(data) as total
FROM trackdata
GROUP BY
name,
country
ORDER BY
sum(data) desc
Take a look here where I have made a SQL fiddle showing this working the way you want it
Depending upon your expected data however you might really be better having a separate table for Country, where each country name only appears once (and also for name maybe). For example, if John is always associated with ENG then you have a repeating group and its better to remove that association from the table above which is really about scores on a track not who is in what country and put that into its own table which is then joined to the track data.
A full solution might have the following tables
**Athlete**
athlete_id
athlete_name
(other data about athletes)
**Country**
country_id
country_name
(other data about countries)
**Track**
Track_id
Track_number
(other data about tracks)
**country_athlete** (this joining table allows for the one to many of one country having many athletes
country_athlete_id
country_id
athlete_id
**Times**
country_athlete_id <--- this identifies a given combination of athlete and country
track_id <--- this identifies the track
data <--- this is where you store the actual time
It can get more complex depending on your data, eg can the same track number appear in different countries? if so then you need another joining table to join one track number to many countries.
Alternatively, even with the poor design of my SQL fiddle example, it might be good to make name,country and track a primary key so that you can only ever have one 'data' value for a given combination of name, country and track. However, this decision, and that of normalising your table into multiple joined tables would be based upon the data you expect to get.
But either way as soon as you say 'I don't know how many tracks there will be' then you should start thinking 'each track's data appears in one ROW and not one COLUMN'.
Like others mentioned, you need to redesign your database. You need an One-To-Many relationship between your Leaderboard table and a new Tracks table. This means that one User can have many Tracks, with each track being represented by a record in the Tracks table.
These two databases should be connected by a foreign key, in this case it could be a user_id field.
The total field in the leaderboard table could be updated every time a new track is inserted or updated, or you could have a query similar to the one you wanted. Here is how such a query could look like:
UPDATE leaderboard SET total = (
SELECT SUM(track) FROM tracks WHERE user_id = leaderboard.user_id
)
I recommend you read about database relationships, here is a link:
https://code.tutsplus.com/articles/sql-for-beginners-part-3-database-relationships--net-8561
I still get a lot of issues with this... I don't think that the issue is the database though, I think it's more they way I pressent the date on the web.
I'm able to get all the data etc. The only thing is my is not filling up the right way.
What I do now is like: "SELECT * FROM `times` NATURAL JOIN `players`
Then <?php foreach... ?>
<tr>
<td> <?php echo $row[playerID];?> </td>
<td> <?php echo $row[Time];?> </td>
....
The thing is it's hard to get sorting, order and SUM all in ones with this static table solution.
I searched around for leaderboards and I really don't understand how they build theres with active order etc. like. https://www.pgatour.com/leaderboard.html
How do they build leaderboards like that? With sorting and everything.
I have a one-to-many relationship of rooms and their occupants:
Room | User
1 | 1
1 | 2
1 | 4
2 | 1
2 | 2
2 | 3
2 | 5
3 | 1
3 | 3
Given a list of users, e.g. 1, 3, what is the most efficient way to determining which room is completely/perfectly filled by them? So in this case, it should return room 3 because, although they are both in room 2, room 2 has other occupants as well, which is not a "perfect" fit.
I can think of several solutions to this, but am not sure about the efficiency. For example, I can do a group concatenate on the user (ordered ascending) grouping by room, which will give me comma separated strings such as "1,2,4", "1,2,3,5" and "1,3". I can then order my input list ascending and look for a perfect match to "1,3".
Or I can do a count of the total number of users in a room AND containing both users 1 and 3. I will then select the room which has the count of users equal to two.
Note I want to most efficient way, or at least a way that scales up to millions of users and rooms. Each room will have around 25 users. Another thing I want to consider is how to pass this list to the database. Should I construct a query by concatenating AND userid = 1 AND userid = 3 AND userid = 5 and so on? Or is there a way to pass the values as an array into a stored procedure?
Any help would be appreciated.
For example, I can do a group concatenate on the user (ordered ascending) grouping by room, which will give me comma separated strings such as "1,2,4", "1,2,3,5" and "1,3". I can then order my input list ascending and look for a perfect match to "1,3".
First, a word of advice, to improve your level of function as a developer. Stop thinking of the data, and of the solution, in terms of CSVs. It limits you to thinking in spreadsheet terms, and prevents you from thinking in Relational Data terms. You do not need to construct strings, and then match strings, when the data is in the database, you can match it there.
Solution
Now then, in Relational data terms, what exactly do you want ? You want the rooms where the count of users that match your argument user list is highest. Is that correct ? If so, the code is simple.
You haven't given the tables. I will assume room, user, room_user, with deadly ids on the first two, and a composite key on the third. I can give you the SQL solution, you will have to work out how to do it in the non-SQL.
Another thing I want to consider is how to pass this list to the database. Should I construct a query by concatenating AND userid = 1 AND userid = 3 AND userid = 5 and so on? Or is there a way to pass the values as an array into a stored procedure?
To pass the list to the stored proc, because it needs a single calling parm, the length of which is variable, you have to create a CSV list of users. Let's call that parm #user_list. (Note, that is not contemplating the data, that is passing a list to a proc in a single parm, because you can't pass an unknown number of identified users to a proc otherwise.)
Since you constructed the #user_list on the client, you may as well compute #user_count (the number of members in the list) while you are at it, on the client, and pass that to the proc.
Something like:
CREATE PROC room_user_match_sp (
#user_list CHAR(255),
#user_count INT
...
)
AS
-- validate parms, etc
...
SELECT room_id,
match_count,
match_count / #user_count * 100 AS match_pct
FROM (
SELECT room_id,
COUNT(user_id) AS match_count -- no of users matched
FROM room_user
WHERE user_id IN ( #user_list )
GROUP BY room_id -- get one row per room
) AS match_room -- has any matched users
WHERE match_count = MAX( match_count ) -- remove this while testing
It is not clear, if you want full matches only. In that case, use:
WHERE match_count = #user_count
Expectation
You have asked for a proc-based solution, so I have given that. Yes, it is the fastest. But keep in mind that for this kind of requirement and solution, you could construct the SQL string on the client, and execute it on the "server" in the usual manner, without using a proc. The proc is faster here only because the code is compiled and that step is removed, as opposed to that step being performed every time the client calls the "server" with the SQL string.
The point I am making here is, with the data in a reasonably Relational form, you can obtain the result you are seeking using a single SELECT statement, you don't have to mess around with work tables or temp tables or intermediate steps, which requires a proc. Here, the proc is not required, you are implementing a proc for performance reasons.
I make this point because it is clear from your question that your expectation of the solution is "gee, I can't get the result directly, I have work with the data first, I am ready and willing to do that". Such intermediate work steps are required only when the data is not Relational.
Maybe not the most efficient SQL, but something like:
SELECT x.room_id,
SUM(x.occupants) AS occupants,
SUM(x.selectees) AS selectees,
SUM(x.selectees) / SUM(x.occupants) as percentage
FROM ( SELECT room_id,
COUNT(user_id) AS occupants,
NULL AS selectees
FROM Rooms
GROUP BY room_id
UNION
SELECT room_id,
NULL AS occupants,
COUNT(user_id) AS selectees
FROM Rooms
WHERE user_id IN (1,3)
GROUP BY room_id
) x
GROUP BY x.room_id
ORDER BY percentage DESC
will give you a list of rooms ordered by the "best fit" percentage
ie. it works out a percentage of fulfilment based on the number of people in the room, and the number of people from your set who are in the room
in a school management system, we need to incorporate 3 semester grades for each subject by each student.
after a discussion, i came up with two solutions.
solution 1
create 3 tables for each semester. (gradeSemester1, gradeSemester2, gradeSemester3)
solution 2
create 1 table called, semesterGrades and with a type handle all 3 semesters.
the reason for solution 1 is to stop data duplication. for example, if there is 8 subjects for a student. this can only contain 8 records in a table where as in solution 2 it can contain up to 24 records of a single student.
what will be the best solution when performance is a major concern ? why solution 2 is better ?
You don't want to change the Database structure depending on the data, so creating a new table whenever you need a new semester is bad design.
All you need is one extra table to store the grades. However I would personally not store them in columns, but in rows to be more flexible (maybe some day you want more than the grades of only 3 semesters).
The table would look like this:
ID | StudentID | SemesterID | SubjectID | Grade
Another advantage of this approach is that you know which semester a grade belongs to. If you have 3 columns for the grades, you only know the grades but you have no information about the semester (I'm guessing he could take more than 3 semesters if needed).
Also I would not worry about performance with this approach. You will have to join tables together but with the proper indexes set up that should not be an issue.
Joining tables is way more costly than a single select because in a join you're selecting and THEN pairing to create a single huge table.
Why not Solution 3:
Create 1 table with 3 columns (one for each semester). That's effectively what your join will be doing each time anyway. Is there any reason to keep them separate?
EDIT (explanation):
Unless I'm misunderstanding something...
A single row in this table would relate a student to a subject and could contain three columns (one for each semester grade). Assuming you have a table for students AND another table for subjects. Containing three semester grades in this table would still be normalized.
TABLE
----------------------
student_id
subject_id
semester1grade
semester2grade
semester3grade
I'm trying to come up with the most simple / userful / efficient method to group 3 users together using mysql.
To set the stage:
X number of users in a list (all with int account_id's)
mini groupings need to be created on a per user basis (user 1 wants to group with 220 for instance).
Max 3 people per grouping (user 1 + user 220 + user 9123 = group full)
Need to easily find if a user is in a group or not without looking in a bunch of columns
I'm stumped about how best to create a schema for this (so I can easily query my table to see if user is in a group, or if they can be added, or check for group space availability).
Anyone have any idea? My initial thought is schema like this (but it really seems too rigid):
Schema
GROUP_ID USER1 USER2 USER3 LASTUPDATE
1 1 220 null 5/25/2011 20:00:00
2 300 2 4 5/25/2011 20:00:00
How would you do it to make something this simple very flexible and efficient. I really feel stupid for asking.
Personally I would approach this by using 3 tables.
Users Table
user_id user_name ..... last_update
Groups Table
group_id group_name ......
Users to groups Table
user_to_group_id user_id group_id
This forms a many to many relationship by linking through the "Users to groups" table, obviously you can have more that 3 users linked to one group so you will have to make your PHP logic check for this when adding a new user to a group.
You can simply use SQL joins to retrieve all the data required and filter the results in your PHP code.
I hope this helps
Kind regards
Garry
I have 3 employers IDs: 1, 2 and 3. I am generating tasks for each one by adding a line in database and in column "for_emp" I insert IDs I want to assign this task for and could be all 3 of them separated by comma. So let's say I got a task and "for_emp" is "1,2,3", the employers IDs. If I would like to select all tasks for the ID 2, will I be able to select from the row that has "1,2,3" as IDs and just match "2" there ? If not, how do you suggest I insert my emp IDs into one row in database ? The db is MySQL.
Any ideas ? Thanks.
Don't do it like that, you should normalize your database.
What you want to do is have a table such as task, and then task_assignee. task_assignee would have fields task_id and user_id. If a task has eg. three assignees (IDs 1, 2 and 3), then you'll create three rows in the task_assignee table for that one task, like this:
+--------+---------+
|task_id | user_id |
+--------+---------+
| 1 | 1 [
| 1 | 2 [
| 1 | 3 [
+--------+---------+
Then it's just a simple matter of querying the task_assignee table to find all tasks that are assigned to a given user.
Here's an example of how to get all the tasks for user_id 2:
SELECT t.* FROM task AS t INNER JOIN task_assignee AS ta WHERE ta.user_id = 2
EDIT.
Just as a related note, even if you didn't do it the right way (which I described in my answer previously), doing it with hacks such as LIKE would still be far from the optimal solution. If you did store a list of comma-separated values, and needed to check if eg. the value 2 is in the list, you could use the MySQL's FIND_IN_SET function:
SELECT * FROM task WHERE FIND_IN_SET(2, for_emp)
But you shouldn't do this unless you have no choice (eg. you're working with someone's shitty DB design), because it's way more inefficient and won't let you index the the employee ID.
The following query should do what you want:
SELECT * FROM tasks WHERE for_emp LIKE '%2%';
However, be aware that that would also match employers 12, 20, 21 etc; so take care if you expect you might end up in double-digits.
However, the other answers about renormalising your database are definitely preferable.
You're doing it wrong. Create a relation table with two fields: employee id and task id. If one task should be assigned to three employees, insert three rows in the relation table.
You then use JOIN to join the task, employee and relation tables.
then its no proper relation...
I would suggest a "mapping table" for the n:m relation
employee
id
task
id
employeetask
task_id
employee_id
Make a table for your employers. Insert your three rows in it.
Then make a table for mapping tasks to employers. If a task is assigned to three employers, insert three rows into this table. This is basic entity-relation work.
I would make 2 different tables.
1 with employees, and 1 with tasks.
then make another table which combines the two tables, I will call it Assigned Tasks.
Then in assigned tasks I make a assigned id, a employeenumber which is a FK to the employee table and a taskid which is a FK to the Tasks table.
If an employee has more than 1 task. Just insert another row in the assigned table. ;)
When its about Databases, try to think in solo entities! Combining those entities is able in antoher table.
sql example:
Select * from Assignedtasks where employeeID = 1 will give you all his/her tasks. :)
You could use a LIKE '%,2,%' clause in your SELECT statement.
eg:
SELECT * FROM table where for_emp LIKE '%,2,%'
However performance of such non-sargable queries is usually quite bad.
I would suggest that you insert a row each for each employee who is assigned to the task using a separate TASK_EMPLOYEE_MAPPING table with taskId, employeeId as a composite primary key.
With such a design, your query will be
SELECT * FROM TASK_EMPLOYEE_MAPPING WHERE employeeId = '2'