Database Modeling Programs

DBDesigner 4 recommended

"DBDesigner 4 is developed and optimized for the open source MySQL-Database to support MySQL users with a powerful and free available design tool."

If you need to build complex SQL databases you will find DbDesigner quite a useful tool. It allows you to construct your DB in an intuitive and easy to use environment, where you have a visual representation of the tables and relations contained in your project. You can quickly see the fields in a table or how each table relates to the others. After you are finished, DbDesigner can export the schema of the database into an .sql script, or directly connect to a database backend and build it there. It can also import already existing databases from .sql scripts or db backends.

I recommend that you download and try to install and use this application. It has been several years since MySQL Workbench was designated as the official MySQL replacement product and reading through the posts on the forum at MySQL , you'll soon discover that there are many problems.

Workbench does not appear to work for many people and there does not appear to be any drive to make it work.

DbDesigner itself may also not work, and there are a few suggested strategies for overcoming
problems listed on the forums. When I installed it on my most recent computer, I couldn't get it to work until I ran a registry cleaner program. So I am now able to view visual representations of my database tables and create tables and their relationships very easily.

Other programs to investigate:

DataArchitect
ERwin
Rational Rose
Database Design Studio Lite