Design Philosophy
Monorise is built around three core principles:
- Designed using a single-table pattern to deliver consistent
O(1)performance for every query — regardless of size or complexity. - The data model is intentionally denormalized to support this performance. While some data may be replicated, all duplication is managed automatically by Monorise, so developers don't have to worry about it.
- Built to feel intuitive and familiar, similar to querying a traditional relational database (like RDS), but with the scalability and speed of modern infrastructure.
Core concepts
This system revolves around three core building blocks:
| Concept | Description |
|---|---|
| Entity | A first-class record (e.g., learner, course) |
| Mutual | A relationship record between two entities that can hold data |
| Tag | A key/value access pattern to quickly query subsets of entities |
These are defined per entity in config files via createEntityConfig (Zod-based). Additionally, Prejoins are computed relationships that "join" through a chain of mutuals to avoid expensive multi-hop queries.