Building the Database and Model

In this chapter, we will design the database that our sample application will use. We will walk through the design of the database and look at some of the tools that we are going to use to help us on our database design journey. We will be using the Postgres database and will look at how to run it locally using Docker. What is Docker? In simple terms, Docker is a tool that allows developers to run a variety of applications such as the database, the HTTP server, system tools, and so on – locally or in the cloud. Docker removes the need to install all the different dependencies required to use a particular application such as a database, and it makes it easier to manage and maintain applications than installing on bare metal in both local and cloud environments. This is possible using Docker because it packages everything into a single file similar to how a compressed file contains different files internally.

We will learn how to design a database that supports the features that we want to build, such as the following:

• Creating an exercise
• Creating a workout plan
• Logging in to the system

We will also explore tools that will help in automatic code generation based on SQL queries, which reduces the amount of database-related code that needs to be written to a large extent. Readers will learn to use the tool to also auto-generate all the relevant CRUD operations without writing a single line of Go code.

In this chapter, we’ll be covering the following:

• Installing Docker
• Setting up Postgres
• Designing the database
• Installing sqlc
• Using sqlc
• Setting up the database
• Generating CRUD with sqlc
• Building the makefile