CODEWITHSUNDEEP
mysqlsqldatabasedatabase-design
ii iml0sto1
ii iml0sto1

Reputation: 1752

Should 2 different tables share the same like/vote table

I'm in a situation where I'm in a bit of doubt of whenever I should give a shared 'like' table or split it up into two different tables.

The application will show both videos/images in a 'wall' like manner, like Facebook and many other platforms do.

If the user has already liked an image or video the like button will be colored to show that the content has already been liked.

Video table

id    title    desc     url    src
------------------------------------
 1    soms     thing   wwww    .png

Image table

id    title    desc      src
------------------------------
 1    soms     thing    .jpg

Options 1 two tables

Vote table video

id    video_fk    user_fk    voted
-----------------------------------------
 1        1           1          2

Vote table image

id    image_fk    user_fk    voted
-----------------------------------------
 1        1           1          2

Options 2 1 table

Vote table shared (type_fk is identifying which type it is, 1 for image 2 for video)

id    content_fk    user_fk    type_fk    voted
-------------------------------------------------
 1        1           1          2          2

The problem with 2 tables is when I have to lookup whenever or not a user has liked the content (when scrolling through the wall with many results) I will have to store the results in a multidimensional array with the id and an identifier to decide which content type it is (image or video).

What would you be the better way, or even a third way?

Upvotes: 0

Views: 48

Answers (1)

JTinkers
JTinkers

Reputation: 1789

You should keep as little tables as possible, because then you reduce amount of requests and complexity of your code.

I would even go as far as to put both videos and images into the same table called 'content', seeing how almost all of your columns are the same.

Upvotes: 1

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