Data Modelling & Relationships

I am figuring out the data model needed to support my app. I have a traditional RDBMS background / mindset, where I apply normalisation in all cases by default…

Reading around NoSQL approaches, it seems with a document-store database, such as MongoDB with a 1-to-many relationship and particularly with heavy reads on the parent I should consider a “nested” approach. This link is an example.

The alternative is a “related” approach with separate documents per object.

Am I correct that Parse really only offers the “related” approach through Pointer or Relation “data types”? We don’t get the option to create “nested” child objects?

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Parse does support nested documents.

A nested document in MongoDB is just a key with an object as value. However, there are some Parse specific limitations on what you can do with nested documents, especially when it comes to querying and updating for example:

These limitations are not set in stone and can be removed if someone wants to pick them up and fix them. The issues already provide the analysis on what to do, so it’s just a matter of picking it up :slight_smile: If it serves you, feel free to pick one of the issues up and I will support you in fixing it.