I would very much like to see a wizard developed for the functional design of databases.
For my start- up, I need to develop the architecture of all the different databases that will store different types of data (customer records, scanned documents, external reference data, change and audit logs, relationships between objects and so on), and although there is plenty of database design software available for professional data architects, I'm not one of them; and I have neither the time nor the inclination to learn how to use these pro tools. At most, I am able to do the high-level architecture and hand it over to better-qualified people in the team.
I would therefore like to be able to use MindManager to lay out the basic field architecture, where each main branch corresponds to a different table and each sub-branch to the fields in the table, link the index key fields using relationship lines (perhaps even showing primary and secondary index links), define the kind of data in the field, and then press a button so that the whole picture then replicates into a pro database tool, with the table and field definitions, linked data fields and so on. The database designer would then be able to take over, put in additional information such as data validation rules, and once the design is complete, use the built-in database creation wizard to actually build the empty Oracle, DB2, OpenSQL or whatever database that will eventually be populated.
Ideally, I would want to add a couple of functions. One is to be able to create aggregation fields (for example, address), which in turn have sub-fields: when I click some button, these sub-fields all become database fields in their own right. A second would be to allow round-trip engineering, just like with the existing MS Project functionality, so that the structure of an existing database, or of one already being worked on by the database designer, cane be displayed and understood in MindManager.
I know such a tool would be invaluable for me, and I'm sure it would also be very helpful for other people with business analysis skills but no experience in DB design.
Is there anyone willing to rise to the challenge?
David