Data Modeling Tool

Recently, I was looking for tools to quickly come up with an ERD (Entity-Relationship Diagram) for one of the client engagements. I wanted it to be something simple but aesthetically pleasing as it was an early stage of the project. I came across an online tool called dbdiagram.io. This tool helped in coming up with a nice pictorial representation of the data model relatively quickly.

Features supported by the tool:

• Primary key representation
• Foreign key representation along with one-to-one, one-to-many, many-to-one relationships
• Support for representing fixed number of values a column can hold through Enum tables
• Support for default values and unique column representation.
• Ability to export created data models into PNG or PDF formats. Also, one can export SQL of the data model for PostgreSQL, SQL Server, and MySQL (account sign-up required to utilize these features)
• Ability to import SQL to generate data model

How does it work?

• Visit dbdiagram.io and come up with a desired data model structure like below. This tool generates data model as soon the entered structure is valid.

// Creating tables Table department as d { department_id int [pk, increment] // auto-increment department_name varchar [not null, unique] created_at datetime [default: `now()`] } // Enum for 'employee' table below Enum employee_status { active retired alumini [note: 'moved on to other career prospects'] // add column note } Table employee as e { employee_id int [pk, increment] // auto-increment employee_name varchar department_id int [ref: > d.department_id] status employee_status created_at datetime [default: `now()`] } Table employee_sales as es { employee_id int [ref: > e.employee_id] sales_date datetime sales_amount float Indexes { (employee_id, sales_date) [pk] } } 

Example output is shown below