Hierarchical data modeling in DynamoDB - Mini Project: Build & Apply

Hierarchical Data Modeling in DynamoDB

📖 Scenario: You are building a simple employee directory for a company. Each employee can have a manager, creating a hierarchy. You want to store this data in DynamoDB so you can easily find employees and their managers.

🎯 Goal: Create a DynamoDB table to store employees with their manager relationships using hierarchical data modeling. You will define the table structure, add a configuration for the partition key, insert employee data, and finalize the table setup.

📋 What You'll Learn

Create a DynamoDB table named Employees with EmployeeID as the partition key.

Add a configuration variable for the sort key named ManagerID.

Insert employee items with EmployeeID, Name, and ManagerID attributes.

Complete the table creation with the key schema and attribute definitions.

💡 Why This Matters

🌍 Real World

Companies often need to store employee-manager relationships to manage organizational charts and reporting structures.

💼 Career

Understanding hierarchical data modeling in DynamoDB is useful for roles involving cloud database design, backend development, and data engineering.

1

Create the DynamoDB table with partition key

Write the AWS CLI command to create a DynamoDB table named Employees with EmployeeID as the partition key of type String.

DynamoDB

# aws dynamodb create-table --table-name Employees --attribute-definitions AttributeName=EmployeeID,AttributeType=S --key-schema AttributeName=EmployeeID,KeyType=HASH --provisioned-throughput ReadCapacityUnits=5,WriteCapacityUnits=5
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Use the aws dynamodb create-table command with --table-name Employees. Define EmployeeID as the partition key with type String (S).

2

Add sort key configuration for ManagerID

Modify the AWS CLI command to add ManagerID as the sort key of type String in the table creation.

DynamoDB

aws dynamodb create-table --table-name Employees --attribute-definitions AttributeName=EmployeeID,AttributeType=S AttributeName=ManagerID,AttributeType=S --key-schema AttributeName=EmployeeID,KeyType=HASH AttributeName=ManagerID,KeyType=RANGE --provisioned-throughput ReadCapacityUnits=5,WriteCapacityUnits=5
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Add ManagerID as a sort key (range key) with type String in both --attribute-definitions and --key-schema.

3

Insert employee items with manager relationships

Write AWS CLI commands to insert two employees: EmployeeID 'E1' named 'Alice' with no manager (empty string), and EmployeeID 'E2' named 'Bob' with manager 'E1'. Use put-item with JSON item data.

DynamoDB

aws dynamodb put-item --table-name Employees --item '{"EmployeeID": {"S": "E1"}, "Name": {"S": "Alice"}, "ManagerID": {"S": ""}}'
aws dynamodb put-item --table-name Employees --item '{"EmployeeID": {"S": "E2"}, "Name": {"S": "Bob"}, "ManagerID": {"S": "E1"}}'
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Use aws dynamodb put-item to add each employee. The ManagerID for Alice is an empty string to indicate no manager.

4

Complete the table setup with key schema and attribute definitions

Ensure the AWS CLI command for creating the Employees table includes both EmployeeID as the partition key and ManagerID as the sort key with correct attribute definitions and key schema.

DynamoDB

aws dynamodb create-table --table-name Employees --attribute-definitions AttributeName=EmployeeID,AttributeType=S AttributeName=ManagerID,AttributeType=S --key-schema AttributeName=EmployeeID,KeyType=HASH AttributeName=ManagerID,KeyType=RANGE --provisioned-throughput ReadCapacityUnits=5,WriteCapacityUnits=5
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Double-check the table creation command includes both keys in attribute definitions and key schema.