Game Programming
Subscription vs. Cash Mall
Online games have come in a wide variety over the years. They have been Free-to-Play [F2P], Pay-to-Play [P2P], Pay-to-Win [P2W], and Cash Mall. Each model is slightly different and has advantages and disadvantages for both the players and the company doing the hosting. In order to understand the different models it is important to understand [...]
Software Design
Welcome to Software Design and Programming! In previous articles more complex concepts were examined in brief. However, this section of the game development process will be taken into specific areas required to produce a fully formed game concept. The software development process is long but through these pages it should be fairly easy to understand [...]
Data Types
There are different data types for the RDBMS and the following lists most of them. It is also important to understand that if a database does not have a specified type it will try to CAST it dynamically to the correct field time. Binary Datatypes Datetime Datatypes Enumerated Datatypes Numeric Datatypes String Datatypes
DROP Statement
The DROP statement will remove a table from the schema. Just like other table alterations, this needs to be handled with the greatest of care. The problem is once a table is dropped the data is lost. It is commonly used for temporary tables and should not be applied to permanent tables unless the DBA [...]
RENAME TABLE
The last option to MODIFY a table is the ability to rename the table. Like other modifications this requires FOREIGN KEY constraints to be removed prior to the action. After this has been done any constraints can be reapplied and the database will have no performance changes. However, it is important to understand that changing [...]
ALTER Statement
The ALTER statement is used when a table needs to be updated. After the creation of the initial table there may be a need to add, update or remove different fields without rebuilding the whole table. The ALTER statement allows this to happen and it has three options ADD, MODIFY, and DROP. ALTER TABLE [...]
CHECK
The CHECK constraint is a bit different than the others. This constraint allows the DBA to limit what information can be inserted into the field. For example if it is a number for a lottery drawing then the numbers must be between 1 and 46. If the number is outside of this range SQL will [...]
UNIQUE INDEX
Most databases use a standardized format for building UNIQUE keys. The standard syntax does work on most databases. The following table displays how to create a UNIQUE key in the different database engines. SQL Syntax Description SQL Database CREATE TABLE table_name (id INT NOT NULL,UNIQUE (id)) Creates a UNIQUE index when the table [...]
INDEX
Indexes are easy to create but they are not always easy to manage but they speed up the search results. There are three types of indexes. The first is the PRIMARY KEY which is indexed by default and must be UNIQUE. The PRIMARY KEY can be either a single column or multiple columns as long [...]
