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An Introduction to Relational Database Theory
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This book introduces you to the theory of relational databases, focusing on the application of that theory to the design of computer languages that properly embrace it. The book is intended for those studying relational databases as part of a degree course in Information Technology (IT). Relational database theory, originally proposed by Edgar F. Codd in 1969, is a topic in Computer Science. Codd’s seminal paper (1970) was entitled A Relational Model of Data for Large Shared Data Banks (reference [5] in Appendix A).
An introductory course on relational databases offered by a university’s Computer Science (or similarly named) department is typically broadly divided into a theory component and what we might call an “industrial” component. The “industrial” component typically teaches the language, SQL (Structured Query Language), that is widely used in the industry for database purposes, and it might also teach other topics of current significance in the industry. Although this book is only about the theory, I hope it will be interesting and helpful to you even if your course’s main thrust is industrial.
In the companion book SQL: A Comparative Survey I show how the concepts covered in this book are treated in SQL, along with historical notes explaining how and when the treatments in question arose in the official version of that language. (Aside: SQL doesn’t officially stand for anything, though it is usually assumed to stand for Structured Query Language. And the standard pronunciation is “ess-cue-ell”, not “sequel”, so a DBMS that supports it is an SQL DBMS, not a SQL DBMS.)
The book is directly based on a course of nine lectures that was delivered annually from 2004 to 2011 to undergraduates at the University of Warwick, England, as part of a 14-lecture module entitled Fundamentals of Relational Databases. The remaining five lectures of that module were on SQL. We encouraged the students to compare and contrast SQL with what they had learned in the theory part. We explained that study of the theory, and an example of a computer language based on that theory, should:
Hugh Darwen - Personal Name
1st Edtion
978-87-403-0777-1
NONE
An Introduction to Relational Database Theory
Management
English
2014
1-235
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