Thato has always been interested in learning different things about the world. Besides his studies
at college to become an environmental lawyer, he has done various short courses on multiple
platforms. He started with a massive open online course (MOOC) on astronomy presented by a
well-known university in the United States of America. He decided not to opt for the official
certificate, so the study did not cost anything. However, it was still quite academic and not what
he hoped to do for fun. So, his search continued.
Then he found an international course marketplace, where the instructors posted their courses
online, and anybody could enrol to watch the video material at any time. He has since learned
how to paint watercolour flowers from an artist in Spain. Additionally, he learned how to repair
broken ceramics from a wonderfully creative person in Japan and even how to create animated
characters from somebody in Italy. These online courses cost him less than a good dinner since he
patiently awaited special offers.
After a while, he started wondering what he could learn from South African people. We have such
talented creative people. Indeed, there must be great content out there. However, he could not
find what he was looking for. Plenty of serious, academic short courses are usually available, with
equally high prices too. There just was not a space for creatives to post their material.
Thato wanted to fill this gap with our South African course marketplace website
After carefully studying the infographic, Thato is now convinced that a database is necessary. But
now, he must choose whether to use a relational or NoSQL database.
Explain to him which type of database (relational or NoSQL) you would recommend and why for
each of the following types of data.
Q.2.2 Videos, pictures, and files the course creators want to make available to those
purchasing their courses.
For storing videos, pictures, and files that course creators want to make available to those purchasing their courses, I would recommend using a NoSQL database. NoSQL databases are well-suited for handling large volumes of unstructured data, such as multimedia files. They are also more flexible and scalable than relational databases, making it easier to store and retrieve multimedia content efficiently.
Additionally, NoSQL databases are designed to handle varying data types, making it easier to store different types of multimedia files in the same database. This would be beneficial for a course marketplace website that is likely to have a wide variety of multimedia content from different course creators.
Overall, using a NoSQL database for storing videos, pictures, and files on the course marketplace website would provide better performance, scalability, and flexibility compared to a relational database.