Well, in my front yard, in Denver, I had to split my yard into zones. I don't remember the names of all the water gadgets we had. But I know that the main spigot in the front was split 5 ways. So the first split was zone 1. That was the drop irrigation for the Washington Hawthors I was growing for hedges. Zone 2 was for hand watering. The other 3 zones had different sprinklers based on how much water was needed for those plants and the shape of the zone.
I used sprinklers in the front so I could spend time in the backyard hand watering. I had a lot of containers, so hand watering was better than anything automatic or semi-automatic because my containers were different sizes and all over the place. But I never put anything on timers. The splitter in the front could water all at once, but I preferred turning on the water and pressure for one zone at a time. This way I could make adjustments if the wind was blowing, or if I needed to move my outdoor chairs so I could still lounge about in one part of the garden while another got watered. And I could keep an eye on my stuff so I would still have something to water with the next day without having to make an emergency sprinkler purchase. My husband set up all the water works. I just had to know how to use them and how to hide them from the thieves.
I have three beds I would like drip irrigation because they are basically just a long and narrow strip. The other three beds would be best served with a low sprinkler. Those oscillating ones that arch way into the air wouldn't work here because it is so dry that most of the water would evaporate. I have trenches filled with straw around most of my plants. When the plants get big, it is easier to just water the trenches, especially with the tomato and pepper plants when I want to make sure the water gets to the roots, not the leaves.
In the pictures above, it looks like I just spread straw around the plants. But I actually dug trenches around the plants and filled the trenches with straw.
