---
title: "Database Design & Management"
category: "Infrastructure"
icon: "🗄️"
short_description: "Database architecture, design, optimization, migration, and managed database services for SQL and NoSQL systems."
---

# Database Design & Management

Expert database solutions from architecture and design to optimization and ongoing management. We help organizations build reliable, performant, and scalable data storage systems.

## Database Design & Architecture

### Relational Database Design
- Entity-relationship modeling (ERD)
- Database normalization (1NF, 2NF, 3NF, BCNF)
- Schema design best practices
- Primary and foreign key relationships
- Indexing strategy
- Constraint definition (unique, check, not null)

### Data Modeling
- Conceptual data modeling
- Logical data modeling
- Physical data modeling
- Dimensional modeling for data warehouses
- Star and snowflake schemas
- Slowly changing dimensions (SCD)

### Architecture Patterns
- Single-instance databases
- Master-slave replication
- Multi-master replication
- Sharding and partitioning
- Database clustering
- Microservices database patterns

## SQL Database Solutions

### PostgreSQL
- Installation and configuration
- Performance tuning (shared_buffers, work_mem, etc.)
- Advanced features (JSONB, full-text search, arrays)
- PostGIS for geospatial data
- Logical replication and streaming
- Connection pooling (PgBouncer)

### MySQL/MariaDB
- MySQL 8.x and MariaDB setup
- InnoDB optimization
- Query cache configuration
- Master-slave replication
- Galera Cluster for high availability
- Backup and recovery (mysqldump, Percona XtraBackup)

### Microsoft SQL Server
- SQL Server installation and licensing
- T-SQL development
- Always On availability groups
- SQL Server Agent jobs
- Integration Services (SSIS)
- Reporting Services (SSRS)

### Other SQL Databases
- Oracle Database administration
- SQLite for embedded applications
- CockroachDB for distributed SQL
- TimescaleDB for time-series data

## NoSQL Database Solutions

### MongoDB
- Document-oriented database design
- Replica set configuration
- Sharded cluster setup
- Aggregation pipeline optimization
- Schema validation
- Change streams for real-time updates

### Redis
- In-memory data structure store
- Caching strategies and patterns
- Pub/Sub messaging
- Redis Sentinel for high availability
- Redis Cluster for horizontal scaling
- Persistence configuration (RDB, AOF)

### Cassandra
- Wide-column store design
- Partition key selection
- Replication strategy
- Consistency level tuning
- Repair and maintenance
- Performance optimization

### Other NoSQL Databases
- Elasticsearch for full-text search
- Neo4j for graph data
- DynamoDB integration
- Couchbase for mobile sync
- InfluxDB for metrics and time-series

## Database Optimization

### Query Optimization
- Query execution plan analysis
- Index optimization
- Query rewriting and restructuring
- Avoiding N+1 queries
- Batch operations
- Prepared statements and parameterization

### Performance Tuning
- Configuration parameter optimization
- Memory allocation tuning
- Connection pool sizing
- Slow query log analysis
- Deadlock detection and resolution
- Vacuum and maintenance operations

### Indexing Strategies
- B-tree indexes
- Hash indexes
- Full-text indexes
- Partial and conditional indexes
- Covering indexes
- Index maintenance and rebuilding

## Database Migration Services

### Migration Planning
- Current state assessment
- Migration strategy development
- Downtime estimation and minimization
- Rollback planning
- Testing and validation procedures

### Database Migrations
- MySQL to PostgreSQL migration
- Oracle to PostgreSQL migration
- SQL Server to PostgreSQL migration
- On-premise to cloud migration (AWS RDS, Azure SQL)
- NoSQL to SQL (and vice versa)
- Data transformation and cleaning

### Schema Migration Tools
- Flyway for version-controlled migrations
- Liquibase for database refactoring
- Alembic for Python applications
- ActiveRecord Migrations (Rails)
- Entity Framework Migrations (.NET)
- Custom migration scripts

## Backup & Disaster Recovery

### Backup Strategies
- Full, incremental, and differential backups
- Point-in-time recovery (PITR)
- Continuous archiving and WAL shipping
- Cross-region backup replication
- Backup encryption
- Backup testing and validation

### High Availability Solutions
- Automatic failover configuration
- Load balancing read queries
- Multi-region active-active setup
- Zero-downtime deployments
- Health checks and monitoring

### Disaster Recovery Planning
- Recovery Time Objective (RTO) planning
- Recovery Point Objective (RPO) planning
- Disaster recovery testing
- Documentation and runbooks
- Incident response procedures

## Database Security

### Access Control
- User and role management
- Principle of least privilege
- Row-level security (RLS)
- Column-level encryption
- Database firewall rules
- VPN and private networking

### Data Encryption
- Encryption at rest (TLS/AES)
- Encryption in transit (SSL/TLS)
- Transparent data encryption (TDE)
- Application-level encryption
- Key management and rotation

### Compliance & Auditing
- GDPR compliance (right to erasure, data portability)
- HIPAA compliance for healthcare data
- PCI DSS for payment data
- Audit logging and retention
- Access log monitoring

## Data Warehousing & Analytics

### Data Warehouse Design
- Star and snowflake schema design
- Fact and dimension tables
- Aggregate tables for performance
- ETL pipeline development
- Data quality and validation

### OLAP Solutions
- Amazon Redshift
- Google BigQuery
- Snowflake data warehouse
- ClickHouse for analytics
- Apache Druid for real-time analytics

### ETL/ELT Processes
- Apache Airflow for orchestration
- Data pipeline development
- Data transformation with DBT
- Incremental data loading
- Data validation and quality checks

## Real-Time & Streaming Data

### Change Data Capture (CDC)
- Debezium for CDC
- Database triggers and notifications
- PostgreSQL logical replication
- MySQL binlog streaming
- Event streaming to Kafka

### Real-Time Analytics
- Apache Kafka integration
- Apache Flink for stream processing
- Real-time aggregations
- Materialized views
- Time-series optimizations

## Database Monitoring

### Performance Monitoring
- Query performance tracking
- Connection pool monitoring
- Slow query identification
- Resource utilization (CPU, memory, I/O)
- Replication lag monitoring

### Monitoring Tools
- Prometheus and Grafana
- pgAdmin for PostgreSQL
- MySQL Workbench
- DataDog database monitoring
- Custom monitoring dashboards

### Alerting & Notifications
- Threshold-based alerts
- Anomaly detection
- Downtime alerts
- Replication failure notifications
- Backup success/failure alerts

## Database as a Service (DBaaS)

### Managed Database Services
- AWS RDS (PostgreSQL, MySQL, SQL Server, Oracle)
- Amazon Aurora (MySQL/PostgreSQL compatible)
- Google Cloud SQL
- Azure SQL Database
- MongoDB Atlas
- Redis Enterprise Cloud

### Self-Hosted Alternatives
- PostgreSQL on Docker/Kubernetes
- MySQL with automation (Ansible)
- Private database clusters
- On-premise high availability
- Hybrid cloud setups

## Specialized Database Services

### Geospatial Databases
- PostGIS for spatial data
- Location-based queries
- Spatial indexing (GiST, R-tree)
- Geographic data visualization
- Distance and proximity calculations

### Time-Series Databases
- TimescaleDB (PostgreSQL extension)
- InfluxDB for metrics
- Prometheus TSDB
- Data retention policies
- Downsampling and aggregation

### Graph Databases
- Neo4j for connected data
- Amazon Neptune
- Relationship queries
- Graph algorithms
- Social network analysis

## Database Development

### Stored Procedures & Functions
- PL/pgSQL (PostgreSQL)
- T-SQL (SQL Server)
- PL/SQL (Oracle)
- Custom function development
- Trigger implementation

### Database API Development
- REST API over database
- GraphQL database integration
- PostgREST for automatic APIs
- Hasura for GraphQL
- Database-backed microservices

## Training & Documentation

- Database administration training
- Query optimization workshops
- Schema design best practices
- Documentation and runbooks
- Knowledge transfer sessions

## Technical Expertise

- **SQL Databases:** PostgreSQL, MySQL, SQL Server, Oracle
- **NoSQL:** MongoDB, Redis, Cassandra, Elasticsearch
- **Cloud:** AWS RDS/Aurora, Google Cloud SQL, Azure SQL
- **Tools:** pgAdmin, DataGrip, DBeaver, Tableau
- **Languages:** SQL, PL/pgSQL, Python, Go

Transform your data management with professional database solutions. Contact us for a consultation on your database needs.