May 2018
Intermediate to advanced
576 pages
30h 25m
English
As I said, the number of tables in a relational database is a good measure of the complexity. But the complexity of what? Well, a complex database may have been designed to be deliberately flexible in order to cover a variety of business situations, or, a complex business process may have a limited portion of its details covered in the database. So, a large number of tables might likely reveal a complex business process or just a complex piece of software.
The highest number of distinct, major tables I've ever seen in a database is 20,000, not counting partitions, views, and work tables. That clearly rates as a very complex system:
| Number of distinct tables (entities) | Complexity rating |
| 20,000 | This is incredibly complex. ... |