sql - Meta Tables in MySQL -

sql - Meta Tables in MySQL -

i'm rewriting scheme linked mysql database 1gb in size. there hundreds of thousands of articles, each list of contributors (think wiki style). i've not yet been given access existing database schema, while wait i've been brainstorming bit.

basically, i'm wondering if having article_contributors table efficient way of handling or if there improve method approaching situation. considering there 200,000 articles, if there 5 contributors on each, that'd 1,000,000 rows in meta table.

i'd phone call one-to-many table, not "meta" table. or else multi-valued attribute.

storing contributors in separate table, 1 per row, proper way of designing relational database. there may other ways store data, not relational.

consider reply is storing delimited list in database column bad? storing contributors list in articles table causes lot of mutual sql queries break or become horribly inefficient. if need variety of queries against data, give thanks storing in normalized fashion.

on other hand, if never query list of contributors indivisible unit, why not store denormalized (as list)? that's valid selection -- depends on how you're going utilize table.

by way, 1 1000000 rows not big mysql database people's standards. week i'm advising client has table 900 1000000 rows.

mysql sql database database-design relational-database