In my three previous xRad posts I explained the use of well known names and how they help make extra rapid application development (xRad) possible.
In this post I will expand on the ‘well known’ concept that speeds up application development by discussing well known table schemas.
There are many database tables that are commonly used in business applications. A few examples are:
Since 1992 we have identified 1104 well known table schemas.
Like well known names, well known table schemas are used in my databases, models, code, generators, and snippets.
And, like well known names, well known schemas reduce development time because they are reusable.
Some benefits of well known table schemas are:
1. When a new project starts up no design time is spent on the well known tables.
2. Programmer documentation about well known schemas has not changed since 2011. We will add more well known tables schemas but they will be additions, not changes.
3. We run one script to install all well known tables at the beginning of a project.
4. Code, text, comment, and documentation generators - auto create data access code, enum code, validation code, classes, and more for the well known tables. Once we install the tables and run the generators everything just works.
We’ve found it’s easier to install the well known tables and generate supporting code than to pick and choose.
In my two previous vRAD posts I explained the concept of well known names and introduced ‘PostalCode’, a well known name I have used for application development since 1992.
At the end of my last xRAD post I asked: Can you think of at least three more ways the well known word PostalCode helps us build applications rapidly?
Here are a few of many correct answers:
In three posts I have explained the concept of well known names and how a single well known name can speed up application development by promoting re use over new development.
Since 1992 we have developed 1513 well known names. Examples are: PhoneNumber, EmailAddress, City, State, Country, Customer, FirstName, LastName, Contact, Url, Product, UnitOfMeasure.
Our well known names are used in schema scripts for databases, in models, in code, generators, in documentation, and much more. We have code snippets for every well known name.
When we start a new project an average of 88% of the names we need come from our well known names.
In future posts I will explain how the ‘well known’ concept applies to other things used for application development; things like ‘well known tables’, well known methods, well known constants, and more.