People Say Database When They Mean Schema

On my current job I manage 111 databases on 28 servers. Some are mid size and clustered but most of them are quite tiny. My predecessor created databases for every customer and application, and test databases for all production databases. That means a good deal of those 111 databases aren’t production.

The tiniest of my databases stores only 17 MB of user data. For what waste more than 300 MB of memory for these 17 MB of actual user data? It seems that customers quite often order databases when they actually mean schemas. In most cases many small applications of a customer can be grouped together in one database. And when different departments or even customers use the same application it could be grouped together in one database too.

My goal is to have as few databases as necessary on as few servers as necessary. It’s somehow better to have one mid size database on high availlability hardware than 20 tiny tiny databases on three old standalone servers. It’s easier to manage and less expensive.