Same data, three problems
A club has sales sheets, a member list and a rota. The files sit on a school server, a cloud account and a firm's system.
Where does each belong? Who may open it? Architecture answers these questions with three jobs.
Key words
| Word | What it means | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Data type | The kind of value a field holds, such as a date or a price. | Date |
| Organise | To group data by a chosen rule. | By type or format |
| Hybrid | A mix of two kinds, such as some data on site and some in the cloud. | Rota on site, photos in the cloud |
| File server | A computer that stores shared files for many people. | The school server |
| Permission | What a person may do with data: read, write or delete. | Read only |
| Level of access | How much of the data a person can reach. | Summary only, or every row |
| Multi-factor authentication | Proving who you are with two or more things, such as a password and a code. | Password plus phone code |
| CSV | A plain text file where commas split each line into columns. | bun,4,2 |
| Database | A store of organised data a program can search. | The member table |
| Cloud | Storage run by a provider and reached over the internet. | An online drive |
The cells students fill in are left blank in this preview.
By the end of this lesson
Note
I can describe how architecture organises data, chooses storage and controls permissions and access.
Starter: what you already know
Have a go
Starter: what you already know
3 questionsYour answers are marked here and are not kept. A college account keeps every student’s marks.
Job one: organise
| Group by | Example |
|---|---|
| Data type | All dates in one place, all prices in another |
| Format: database | Members and loans |
| Format: spreadsheet | Quick weekly totals |
| Format: CSV file | A simple export to share |
The cells students fill in are left blank in this preview.
Job two: choose storage
| Place | What it means |
|---|---|
| On premises | On your own equipment and site |
| Cloud | On a provider's equipment, over the internet |
| Third party | Held or run by another firm for you |
| Hybrid | A planned mix of these |
The cells students fill in are left blank in this preview.
Job three: permissions and access
Across systems such as a file server, set levels of permission: read, write, delete. Also set levels of access: summary only, or every row.
Add multi-factor authentication. Proving who you are with a password and a code stops a stolen password being enough.
Try it: multi-factor sign-in
password_ok = True
code_ok = False
mfa_on = True
if mfa_on:
allowed = password_ok and code_ok
else:
allowed = password_ok
print("Sign in allowed:", allowed)
# Try it: set code_ok to True and press Run.