Any help and advice deeply appreciated. I want to create a RoR website that is a chinese dictionary with 2 million entries (records in the SQLite database). Each record has 3 fields: a long Chinese word, an English text, and an integer counter (is updated every time the word has been solicited, +=1).
The user inputs a Chinese word, the system searches for it in the database and gives back the result.
The questions are:
1.- Is it doable in a way that is fast enough (less than a few seconds per query) in a system that runs in a new desktop computer?. Am I right to consider that I will need to index the table by the Chinese Word? If so, will updating the counter (third field) affect and force a reindexing of the db?
2.- Inside the RoR and Ruby field, what else should I consider, research, learn?
3.- I want to make a test with a strip down version of the site and a database filled with 2 million fake records (permutations of Chinese characters). I have the scripts to fill the rows, but what is the most efficient way to insert the records in an already created database?
I know it is a lot of questions at a gulp, but the answers from developers with experience will help me a lot to know what I am up against.
Thanks for your help.