For Windows platform: which Dia plugin or App to simplify design and documentation of small Database Applications ?

[Paul Smith <paul smithy987 gmail com>]

@  Andrey

Thank you for your suggestion of MySQL Workbench.  Interesting lead.  With MySQL in the name I had assumed not worth investigating for use with HSQLDB (when choosing a RDBMS I was looking for one adhering closely to SQL standards and suitable for a low power platform such as a nettop, so I rejected MySQL as read it was not very compliant, also the Oracle takeover sounds bad news for it). However I see the Wiki states from ver 5.2.41 it adds support for a few other specific RDBMS, and generically for any ODBC connection.

Spent half an hour skimming the User Manual - which seems quite impressive at 466 pages. Googling also brings up many other PDF's on use (with MySQL)  I have 2 concerns before delving further:  the Manual states hardware requirments are 2-core 2GHz + 4GB RAM.  My HW is 2-core 1.6GHz + 2GB RAM, FHD Monitor, Win7 32bit. CalEvens.com review of Community Edition in 2009 states 'its dog slow but best there is'.  Is todays Windows version faster or slower ?  Secondly, the Manual makes no mention of HSQL support - only 'any ODBC compliant db'....  being new to server/client, do you know if its likely to 'simplify design and documentation of small [20 table HSQLDB] Database Applications' ?   

@ Steffen

Thank you for pointing me to that clear and well-written introductory tutorial.   To cut evaluation time, I would like to download the .dia, .sql files used in his tutorial and run them on my nettop using the tool you recommend - but alas his links are dead.  Do you know where I can obtain the 3 files, or if not, an equivalent .dia/.sql set ?    A matter in his tutorial of concern, is to configure the tool to use the syntax of the target RDBMS, you need a 'typemap' file in order to use all the functionality of the target, but only shows how to create it.  Thats fine if the wheel hasnt been invented, but surely the 'typemap' needs many entries to support all relevant features of each target DB ?  Are there not predefined 'typemap' files supporting all relevant features of target DB, in this case HSQLDB, users can download ?

Lastly, you ask if this is what I'm looking for.  Not sure...  Ideally, I was looking for a dia 'plugin' that hopefully adds at the simplest level, say 3 buttons:  <Select Plugin> (HSQLDB), <Validate [ERD] Model>, and <Make SQL>.

I thank you both for your assistance.