存储自由格式数据的最佳方法是什么？

Question

I'm using Zend Framework and MySQL. The users of my application will have the ability to store arbitrary amounts of data, structured like tables. The problem is, I won't know the "columns" before hand. So, I can't create a ready-made table or ready made Zend Framework Model.

In a previous version of the application, a table schema was generated automatically from the data. This worked well. The problem this time is that I don't know how to create a Zend Framework Model to represent an arbitrary data source. Does anyone have any idea of what the best strategy is for my case? And no, rethinking my application requirements isn't an option :).

By the way: In an even older version of the application, the data was stored as JSON. This approach was very slow.

Answer 1

If you can't use NoSQL, take a look at the Entity Attribute Value (EAV) model. It allows for flexible attributes via a sort of metadata model.

It may not perform well if you have a large amount of data, and can be a bit painful to maintain vs.a fully relational schema. I would not recommend it as a first option, but if you REALLY can't know the schema up front it is one way you could go.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Entity-attribute-value_model