Hi All,


I am in the process of making an online directory and to do this I wish to store all the information for each business in a database so that when eventually I have some better technology behind the site I can store/retrieve data from the database with minimal fuss, my only concern is what type of data base do you guys think would be the best to use for this instance? The way I'm going I just might use an excel spread sheet

Thanks

Anything apart from Excel

It will depend on what your host supports.

PHP and mySQL is good.

I have to agree, I've always been a PHP\MySQL fan.

YEah he is right it depends on what host you are using.. If it support by PHP or MySQL...

There's a full broad of db available outside mysql....

sqlite, if you don't need 1+ million rows, nor network connectivity, is great.
postgresql is one of my favorite.
Oracle PE, ms sql server looks interesting, ibm DB2, firebird.....

There are tons of db engines, and not all costs thousands.
Beside, they each have thers + and -, so document yourself well before choosing one or the other.

Mysql is very versatile, thanks to it's plugin based backend, but I personally prefer postgresql much more.
Personal taste, and background.

MS SQL Server has been said to be the best product Microsoft has ever or will ever produce. I have used it and it is really, really nice. It has a lot of enterprise features. However, when I develop something for myself, I use MySQL. It is free, it runs on many different platforms (unlike MS SQL Server, which is Windows-only), it is supported by just about every web hosting company - and for the most part, you can rig up some mechanism to dump data out of MySQL and import it into some other database software if you decide (for example) you want to go with Postgres or MS SQL Server.

Here's some information you haven't mentioned yet - what platform are you developing from? Windows? Linux? Shared server? Dedicated? Is this going to be a PHP app?

Hell, if all you've got is a Windows machine, and it doesn't have to have amazing performance, you might want to use MS Access. It integrates with other Office applications and I think it can be queried over ODBC.

I'm not sure I'd say "if all you've got is a Windows machine" since people pay a premium for them?

I'd say variable character unicode is the best database type for a web directory, because it allows for more languages and character sets.

I'm playing with it for some times, and I have to say that I moved almost all my DB work on postgresql...

A real nifty application, I would say.
And if peoples tell you that it's slow, my bench on a select intensive application returned the same results (with 2 or 3 % of differences, so no noticeable differences).

And just for the presence of REAL foreign keys, it's good enough to ditch mysql away.

What's this about real foreign keys in MySQL?

They don't exists....

Originally Posted by Learning Newbie

I'm not sure I'd say "if all you've got is a Windows machine" since people pay a premium for them?

What I meant was, if all he's got is a desktop machine.

MySQL is a good solution.

Originally Posted by Crankshaft

What I meant was, if all he's got is a desktop machine.

You'll be shocked to learn that Windows Server exists.

Originally Posted by Learning Newbie

You'll be shocked to learn that Windows Server exists.

I know that there are people who are forced to pay extra for that, yes.