ELI5: Explain Like I'm 5

Dimension table

Imagine you have a very big box which has lots of little boxes inside. Each little box has a special thing in it like a toy car or a doll. The big box is like a database and the little boxes are like tables inside the database.

Now, let's imagine you have a special box for all your toy cars. This box has all the important information about your toy cars like the color, the brand, and the model. This special box is like a dimension table inside the database.

A dimension table is a special table in a database that stores important information about a particular subject, like toy cars or customers. It usually contains a unique identifier for each object, like a toy car’s serial number or a customer's ID. It can also contain other important information like the date the object was created or its price.

So, if you have a database for a toy store, you might have a dimension table for all your toy cars, with important information about each one, like the car's make, the color, and its price. This information can be used to answer questions about the toy cars like, "How many red toy cars do we have in stock?" or "What is the average price of a toy car?"

In summary, a dimension table is like a special box that holds important information about a particular subject, like toy cars or customers, and is used to help answer questions about that subject in a database.