Posted by Erland Sommarskog on 12/18/06 22:50

Erik Lautier (lautier@gmail.com) writes:
> I have a content site where everything is currently in one SQL Server
> DB. As I add features to the site, for example message boards and
> blogging, does it make sense to put those features in a separate
> database? What would I lose and gain in doing so? Thanks so much.

It's difficult to say without knowing more about the business as such.
But assuming that you have common concepts like users, and you may want
to have links between different entities, a single database makes life
simpler. Cross-databases references are messy.

But if the message board and the blogs are entirely unrelated, separate
databases may be a better idea.

One advantage of separate databases, is that if the message-board database
crashes, the blog database may still be available.

--
Erland Sommarskog, SQL Server MVP, esquel@sommarskog.se

Books Online for SQL Server 2005 at
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/sql/2005/downloads/books.mspx
Books Online for SQL Server 2000 at
http://www.microsoft.com/sql/prodinfo/previousversions/books.mspx

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