I'm looking for thoughts on the best way to handle dynamic schemas.
The application I am developing revolves around user defined entities. Each entity is a tabular dataset with user defined columns and data types. Entities can also be related to each other through Parent-Child relationships. Some entities will be 100% user driven, while others (such as an entity representing a photo) will be partially user driven (all photo entities will have common fields + custom user additions).
I was hoping to get opinions on whether postgresql would be a suitable backend. A couple of options I have thought of are:
1. Each entity is represented as a table in psql. The schema would be dynamically updated (with limits) when an entity mapping is updated. I believe that this would provide the best data constraints and allow the best data normalization. A concern I have is that there could be an enormous amount of tables generated and the performance impacts this might have in the future. I could then run elasticsearch as a denormalized cache for efficient querying and full-text-search.
2. Use a nosql database. This provides the "dynamic" schema aspect. A concern here is the lack of relation support, thus leading to a more denormalized data structure and the potential for the data to become corrupted.
Any opinions on the use of psql for this case, or other options would be greatly appreciated!
RJ
