how to make a "properties" table more relational ?

Hello, I'm working on a Real estate project ,

Let's say there is 3 types in real estates (apartment, house and land)

actually I have one table property which is "not dynamic" because it's like :

----------------------------------------------
property
-----------------------------------------------
id
(...)
house_property_1
house_property_2
house_property_3
(...)
apartment_property_1
apartment_property_2
apartment_property_3
apartment_property_4
(...)
land_property_1
land_property_2
land_property_3
land_property_4
-----------------------------------------------

It seems not correct because these properties are not static.

I'm wondering how to extract 3 tables from the table above and how should be the relationship between them ?

Thanks

automica

5 years ago

Level 54

@godzilaravel create a model called Property and then give each Property a property_type where property_types are [land,apartment,house].

You can then use a polymorphic relationship between your Project and Property to get collections of the various types.

https://laravel.com/docs/7.x/eloquent-relationships#polymorphic-relationships

Snapey

5 years ago

Level 122

You might be better referring to them as attributes because property (house/land/apartment) having property(attributes) will get a bit confusing.

Many ecommerce systems use something called an Entity Attribute Value (EAV) table - basically a table that can hold any type of attribute as a key:value store. Its a bit more work to setup, but gives you a more flexible architecture since you can hold anything in it.

Suppose for instance you decide that houses should record if they are brick or wood construction, and you don't have a column for that, then you have to alter the database design to add a 'construction' column, whereas with an EAV store, you would record property_id, 'construction','wood' for instance. New attributes may be added without necessarily having to alter the database design.

If you want to go with a more flat style, yet need to store different attributes per property type, then check this article of mine. If talks about how you might store different user profiles using a polymorphic relationship. The different profiles are the same as your house/apartment/land.

http://novate.co.uk/using-laravel-polymorphic-relationships-for-different-user-profiles/

automica

5 years ago

Level 54

@snapey nice. I've come across the EAV model via magento. sounds like its a good fit here.

I'll give that article a look too. Always good to see get an experienced view on this subject.

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