Relational Database Essentials (with a deck of cards)
Salt Lake Software Symposium
Salt Lake City · June 5 - 6, 2015
About this Presentation
Relational databases are the foundation to countless systems but are often abstracted away and ignored until queries start timing out. Learn the essentials of indexing, query tuning and database design; all explained with a deck of playing cards.
We start with the fundamentals: Normalization, the 7 types of joins (that's right, 7!) and internal data structures.
From there we dive deep into how indexes work, performance considerations of indexes and even why the database sometimes ignores your indexes.
Digging even deeper, learn the three ways the database will implement a join. Finally learn some miscellaneous tips to improve your SQL and security.
Software Architect & Magician
Michael Carducci spent years learning to see things as they actually are; first as a magician, then as a software architect, now as both simultaneously. And somehow that’s not even the whole story.
He’s the author of Mastering Software Architecture (Apress, 2025) and is currently writing The Semantic Layer. He has spent over 25 years following interesting problems; through roles from individual contributor to CTO and back again, across industries and continents.
As a speaker, he applies the same toolkit he uses in close-up magic: attention, misdirection, timing, storytelling, and the instinct to take the long way around when that’s where the truth lives. Audiences at hundreds of conferences across four continents have described his talks as the kind that change how you think about a problem rather than just what you know about it.
He also makes YouTube videos about technology and curiosity with his wife Kate, because some ideas are too important (or too interesting!) to leave only in conference rooms.