wwwsqldesigner – mockup tool for DBAs
What do you need from database modelling tool?
If you need a full-blown enterprise-class modelling tool - OK, I understand, go and get one.
If you don't need diagramming on design stage (or all developers in your team are play-chess-in-my-mind types of guys), go and write SQL DDL. It's fun.
If you are still here, you might think - as I do - that:
- in early stages of database development, diagrams are often needed as a modelling and communication tool;
- Relational database is, after all, composed from a set of basic elements, constrained with basic rules;
- Modelling can be complex, but this should not mean: complicated! Simplicity in all aspects is what you want.
If so, you might be interested in wwwsqldesigner.
The tool is html+javascript+xml+slt, with some backend in php. It can
- draw and create database schemas directly in browser
- create tables and attributes
- create constraints (PK, UNIQUE, FK)
- create single or multifield indexes
- add comments on tables and attributes
- print, save, load diagrams
- SQL export (generate DDL)
- XML export/import (xml is the native format of wwwsqldesigner)
- reverse engineering (import schema from database)
- export implemented as XSLT transforms, so you can fix it (xslt is easy)
Here is demo installation. And here's my local install. I am testing this tool with PostgreSQL (both as a backend, and as a model target), and it works most of the time.
Note: If you want to test it on your own webserver, please make sure that you take fresh SVN checkout. It has several improvements over last packaged version.
I do not claim it's ultimate design tool. No, this is all about early database design.
