Designing the database for our site

We are going to build an example application, so that you will be able to give all this a try. In this case we are going to build a website monitoring program, to help you test websites, keep reports of what has been done in each one, and so on. Firstly, let's set some objectives. These are:

So, the first thing you will need is a database of websites to check. Set up a database called websites in MySQL or whatever RDBMS you're using. You can get all the SQL necessary to create the tables needed in your application in the chapter Appendix. Copy it and execute the SQL into your database in order to generate the database structure.

Summarizing it a little you will have a site table, to keep information about your sites, a hosts table associated to a domains table, and of course a people table. Don't worry about all the structure for now, just copy it and generate the structure executing the queries.

After creating the database structure take a look at the preceding diagram, it will help you know which tables relate to other tables. You will need a simple flexible way of accessing all this. So, let's turn to what CI offers, and in particular to its Active Record class.