Inventory database structure when inventory items have varying attributes

Question

I'm building an inventory database to store enterprise hardware information. The devices the database keeps track of range from workstations, laptops, switches, routers, mobile phones, etc. I'm using device serial numbers as the primary key. The problem I'm having is that the other attributes for these devices vary and I don't want to have fields in the inventory table that are unrelated to other devices. Below is a link to an ERD of part of the database (some FK relations are not shown). I'm trying to set it up, for example, so a device with a workstation device type can't be put into the phones table. This seems to require the use of a lot of triggers to validate the device type or class, and new tables anytime a different device with different attributes will be tracked; not to mention all of the one-to-one relationships which will make joins a nightmare (there are more one-to-one relationships not shown).

I looked into setting up attribute tables that can be mapped to serial numbers, but that would allow attributes that do not apply to a device type to be assigned to a device, e.g., someone could assign a phone number attribute to a workstation if they wanted. I found an explanation on this site that gave the following structure:

This structure would work great if the attributes were all applicable to the items I am storing. For example if the database was storing only mobile phones, the attributes could be things like touchscreen, trackpad, keyboard, 4G, 3G...whatever. In that case, they all apply to phones. My database would have attributes like hostname, circuitType, phoneNumber, which only apply to specific types of devices.

I want to set it up so only the attributes that apply to a given device type can be assigned to a device of that type. Any suggestions on how to setup this database? I'm not sure if this is a proper use of one-to-one relationships, or if there is a better way to do this. Thank you in advance for taking the time to look into this.

Here are some of the other threads I read. They gave me some good insight, but I don't think they really apply:

https://stackoverflow.com/questions/9335548/how-to-structure-database-for-inventory-of-unlike-items

https://stackoverflow.com/questions/1249632/database-structure-for-items-with-varying-attributes

https://stackoverflow.com/questions/5559587/product-inventory-with-multiple-attributes

https://stackoverflow.com/questions/6613802/question-about-setting-up-inventory-database

https://stackoverflow.com/questions/514111/how-to-best-represent-items-with-variable-of-attributes-in-a-database

Answer 1

Supertype/Subtype

How about looking into the supertype/subtype pattern? Common columns go in a parent table. Each distinct type has its own table with the ID of the parent as its own PK and it contains unique columns not common to all subtypes. You can include a type column in both parent and children tables to ensure each device can't be more than one subtype. Make an FK between the children and the parent on (ItemID, ItemTypeID). You can use FKs to either the supertype or subtype tables to maintain the desired integrity elsewhere. For example, if the ItemID of any type is allowed, create the FK to the parent table. If only SubItemType1 can be referenced, create the FK to that table. I would leave the TypeID out of referencing tables.

Naming

When it comes to naming, you have two choices as I see it (since the third choice of just "ID" is in my mind a strong anti-pattern). Either call the subtype key ItemID like it is in the parent table, or call it the subtype name such as DoohickeyID. After some thought and some experience with this, I advocate calling it DoohickeyID. The reason for this is that even though there could be confusion about the subtype table really in disguise containing Items (rather than Doohickeys), that is a small negative compared to when you create an FK to the Doohickey table and the column names don't match!

To EAV or not to EAV - My experience with an EAV database

If EAV is what you truly have to do, then it's what you have to do. But what if it weren't what you had to do?

I built an EAV database that is in use in a business. Thank God, the set of data is small (though there are dozens of item types) so the performance is not bad. But it would be bad if the database had more than a few thousand items in it! Additionally, the tables are so HARD to query. This experience has led me to really desire to avoid EAV databases in the future if at all possible.

Now, in my database I created a stored procedure that automatically builds PIVOTed views for each and every subtype that exists. I can just query from AutoDoohickey. My metadata about the subtypes has a "ShortName" column containing an object-safe name suitable for use in view names. I even made the views updateable! Unfortunately, you cannot update them on a join, but you CAN insert to them an already-existing row, which will be converted to an UPDATE. Unfortunately, you cannot update only a few columns, because there is no way to indicate to the VIEW which columns you want to update with the INSERT-to-UPDATE conversion process: a NULL value looks like "update this column to NULL" even if you wanted to indicate "Don't update this column at all."

Despite all this decoration to make the EAV database easier to use, I still don't use these views in most normal querying because it is SLOW. Query conditions are not predicate pushed all the way back to the Value table, so it has to build an intermediate result set of all the items of that view's type before filtering. Ouch. So I have many, many queries with many, many joins, each one going out to get a different value and so on. They perform relatively well, but ouch! Here's an example. The SP that creates this (and its update trigger) is one giant beast, and I'm proud of it, but it is not something you want to ever try to maintain.

CREATE VIEW [dbo].[AutoModule]
AS
--This view is automatically generated by the stored procedure AutoViewCreate
SELECT
   ElementID,
   ElementTypeID,
   Convert(nvarchar(160), [3]) [FullName],
   Convert(nvarchar(1024), [435]) [Descr],
   Convert(nvarchar(255), [439]) [Comment],
   Convert(bit, [438]) [MissionCritical],
   Convert(int, [464]) [SupportGroup],
   Convert(int, [461]) [SupportHours],
   Convert(nvarchar(40), [4]) [Ver],
   Convert(bit, [28744]) [UsesJava],
   Convert(nvarchar(256), [28745]) [JavaVersions],
   Convert(bit, [28746]) [UsesIE],
   Convert(nvarchar(256), [28747]) [IEVersions],
   Convert(bit, [28748]) [UsesAcrobat],
   Convert(nvarchar(256), [28749]) [AcrobatVersions],
   Convert(bit, [28794]) [UsesDotNet],
   Convert(nvarchar(256), [28795]) [DotNetVersions],
   Convert(bit, [512]) [WebApplication],
   Convert(nvarchar(10), [433]) [IFAbbrev],
   Convert(int, [437]) [DataID],
   Convert(nvarchar(1000), [463]) [Notes],
   Convert(nvarchar(512), [523]) [DataDescription],
   Convert(nvarchar(256), [27991]) [SpecialNote],
   Convert(bit, [28932]) [Inactive],
   Convert(int, [29992]) [PatchTestedBy]
FROM (
   SELECT
      E.ElementID + 0 ElementID,
      E.ElementTypeID,
      V.AttrID,
      V.Value
   FROM
      dbo.Element E
      LEFT JOIN dbo.Value V ON E.ElementID = V.ElementID
   WHERE
      EXISTS (
         SELECT *
         FROM dbo.LayoutUsage L
         WHERE
            E.ElementTypeID = L.ElementTypeID
            AND L.AttrLayoutID = 7
      )
) X
PIVOT (
   Max(Value)
   FOR AttrID IN ([3], [435], [439], [438], [464], [461], [4], [28744], [28745], [28746], [28747], [28748], [28749], [28794], [28795], [512], [433], [437], [463], [523], [27991], [28932], [29992])
) P;

Here's another type of automatically-generated view created by another stored procedure from special metadata to help find relationships between items that can have multiple paths between them (Specifically: Module->Server, Module->Cluster->Server, Module->DBMS->Server, Module->DBMS->Cluster->Server):

CREATE VIEW [dbo].[Link_Module_Server]
AS
-- This view is automatically generated by the stored procedure LinkViewCreate
SELECT
   ModuleID = A.ElementID,
   ServerID = B.ElementID
FROM
   Element A
   INNER JOIN Element B
      ON EXISTS (
         SELECT *
         FROM
            dbo.Element R1
         WHERE
            A.ElementID = R1.ElementID1
            AND B.ElementID = R1.ElementID2
            AND R1.ElementTypeID = 38
      ) OR EXISTS (
         SELECT *
         FROM
            dbo.Element R1
            INNER JOIN dbo.Element R2 ON R1.ElementID2 = R2.ElementID1
         WHERE
            A.ElementID = R1.ElementID1
            AND R1.ElementTypeID = 40
            AND B.ElementID = R2.ElementID2
            AND R2.ElementTypeID = 38
      ) OR EXISTS (
         SELECT *
         FROM
            dbo.Element R1
            INNER JOIN dbo.Element R2 ON R1.ElementID2 = R2.ElementID1
         WHERE
            A.ElementID = R1.ElementID1
            AND R1.ElementTypeID = 38
            AND B.ElementID = R2.ElementID2
            AND R2.ElementTypeID = 3122
      ) OR EXISTS (
         SELECT *
         FROM
            dbo.Element R1
            INNER JOIN dbo.Element R2 ON R1.ElementID2 = R2.ElementID1
            INNER JOIN dbo.Element C2 ON R2.ElementID2 = C2.ElementID
            INNER JOIN dbo.Element R3 ON R2.ElementID2 = R3.ElementID1
         WHERE
            A.ElementID = R1.ElementID1
            AND R1.ElementTypeID = 40
            AND C2.ElementTypeID = 3080
            AND R2.ElementTypeID = 38
            AND B.ElementID = R3.ElementID2
            AND R3.ElementTypeID = 3122
      )
WHERE
   A.ElementTypeID = 9
   AND B.ElementTypeID = 17

The Hybrid Approach

If you MUST have some of the dynamic aspects of an EAV database, you could consider creating the metadata as if you had such a database, but instead actually using the supertype/subtype design pattern. Yes, you would have to create new tables, and add and remove and modify columns. But with the proper pre-processing (like I did with my EAV database's Auto views) you could have real table-like objects to work with. Only, they wouldn't be as gnarly as mine and the query optimizer could predicate push down to base tables (read: perform well with them). There would just be a one join between the supertype table and the subtype table. Your application could be set to read the metadata to discover what it is supposed to do (or it can use the auto-generated views in some cases). This protects your application code from having to be touched extensively just to add or modify things.

Or, if you had a multi-level set of subtypes, just a few joins. By multi-level I mean when some subtypes share common columns, but not all, you could have a subtype table for those that is itself a supertype of a few other tables. For example, if you are storing information about Servers, Routers, and Printers, an intermediate subtype of "IP Device" could make sense.

I will give the caveat that I haven't yet made such a hybrid supertype/subtype EAV-metatable-decorated database like I'm suggesting here yet to try out in the real world. But the problems I've experienced with EAV are not small, and doing something is probably an absolute must if your database is going to be large and you want good performance without some crazy expensive gigantic hardware.

In my opinion, the time spent automating the use/creation/modification of real subtype tables would ultimately be best. Focusing on flexibility driven by data makes the EAV sound so attractive (and believe me I love how when someone asks me for a new attribute on an element type I can add it in about 18 seconds and they can immediately start entering data on the web site). But flexibility can be accomplished in more than one way! Pre-processing is another way to do it. It's such a powerful method that so few people use, giving the benefits of being totally data-driven but the performance of being hard-coded.

(Note: Yes those views really are formatted like that and the PIVOT ones really do have update triggers. :) If someone is really that interested in the awful painful details of the long and complicated UPDATE trigger, let me know and I'll post a sample for you.)

And One More Idea

Put all your data in one table. Give columns generic names and then reuse/abuse them for multiple purposes. Create views over these to give them sensible names. Add columns when a suitable-data-type unused column is not available, and update your views. Despite my length going on about subtype/supertype, this may be the best way.

Answer 2

In your case the best approach is a variation on the Entity-Attribute-Value (EAV) model. There are lots of people who shy away from EAV because it is unhelpful in some ways and misused a lot of the time. However, EAV is a solution that works well for your specific requirements.

The variation that you want to include for your situation is to abstract the attributes one level away from your entities (i.e. your inventory items). Essentially you want to define device types which have a list of attributes. Then you define device instances which have values for each of the attributes which devices of that type are supposed to have.

Here is an ERD sketch:

DEVICE_ATTRIBUTE contains the values for each type of generic attribute. DEVICE_TYPE defines the list of generic attributes which apply to a given type of device (these are the TYPICAL_DEVICE_ATTRIBUTEs.

This lets you control which attributes need to be filled out for a device while letting devices of different type have different lists of attributes. It also makes it easy for you to compare across devices by lining their attributes up against one-another.

Answer 3

1. The overall approach is as follows:

a) An Entity-Attribute-Value model approach to tackle the attributes of the different devices to a device type. Each device type will have a list of attributes whose values you track

b) For each device type, you track the inventory details by serial number which corresponds to a single device.

1. So you would end up with the following tables:

a) Attributes - define the attributes for all devices (anything goes in this table) columns: id, name, description

b) Item Attributes - defines the allowed attributes for a specific device - itemid, attributeid

c) Item Definition - defines an item say Black Berry Torch 4500, Iphone 4S, Iphone 3S etc - id, name, description, categoryid (if you want to add categories like mobile phones, switches etc)

d) Devices - the individual devices - id, itemid, inventorydate, deactivatedate, serialnumber ... (basically all other attributes for a device)

If you want to track any other information on device transcations then you can add more tables linked to the device as you need.