The Relational Model

CS 186, Spring 2007, Lecture 2 Cow book Section 1.5, Chapter 3 Mary Roth

Administrivia
Homework 0
Due next Tuesday, Jan 23 10 p.m. Submission instructions added to homework description Class account forms here if you need them

Discussion sections will meet today Questions?

Outline
What we learned last time
What is and what good is a DBMS anyway? Components of a DBMS

New stuff
A brief history of databases The relational data model

Review: What is a database?

A collection of data organized for rapid search and retrieval
Data collection has some logical meaning, and some reason for it to be organized in a particular way.

Review: What is a DBMS?

A software system designed to manage a database.
Think big and lots of data
300,000,000 bank accounts

Think mission critical

1,000,000 transactions a day

You d need a DBMS to:

Help you find things fast Help you keep track of what s going on

Review: ACID properties

A DBMS ensures a database has ACID properties: Atomicity nothing is ever half baked; database changes either happen or they don t. Consistency you can t peek at the data til it is baked; database changes aren t visible til they are commited Isolation concurrent operations have an explainable outcome; multiple users can operate on a database without conflicting Durability what s done is done; once a database operation completes, it remains even if the database crashes

Review: DBMS components

A DBMS is like an ogre; it has layers
We re going to learn about these layers all semester We re going to build several layers in our homework projects Query Optimization and Execution Relational Operators Files and Access Methods Buffer Management Disk Space Management

DB

Review: DBMS componentsfor a specific task Talks to DBMS to manage data

Database application Query Optimization and Execution Relational Operators Access Methods Buffer Management Disk Space Management
-> e.g. app to withdraw/deposit money or provide a history of the account Figures out the best way to answer a question -> There is always nore than 1 way to skin a cat! Provides generic ways to combine data -> Do you want a list of customers and accounts or the total account balance of all customers? Provides efficient ways to extract data -> Do you need 1 record or a bunch? Makes efficient use of RAM -> Think 1,000,000 simultaneous requests! Makes efficient use of disk space -> Think 300,000,000 accounts!

DB

Review: How does a DBMS work?

Database app Query in: e.g. Select min(account balance) Data out: e.g. 2000

Query Optimization and Execution Relational Operators Access Methods Buffer Management Disk Space Management

Customer accounts stored on disk

Review: Typical architecture for DB applications

1.
Enter queries, etc. By typing text

2.
Graphically compose queries, look at data

3.
Embed database access in a program

4.
Embed database access in a web application

Web browser

Command line

GUI

JDBC/ODBC app

App server JDBC/ODBC

DBMS

Summary: Benefits of a DBMS

1. Data independence
applications worry about what data they want, not how it is stored

2. Efficient data access

DBMS is smart about how to retrieve data

3. Data integrity and security

DBMS won t let you corrupt data

4. Centralized administration
stored data on single server and let people specialize in managing it

5. Concurrent access
Handles multiple users efficiently and recoverably

6. Reduced application development time

Derived from 1-5

Minibase is a Java-based DBMS

Database application Query Optimization and Execution Relational Operators Access Methods Buffer Management Disk Space Management

Homework 5 Homework 3 (Pencil-work) Homework 4 Homework 2 Homework 1 Provided for you

DB

Intermission
Get up and stretch Ask a quick question Get a drink of water

A brief history of databases

Birth of the DBMS parallels adoption of computer over 1960s and 1970s 1960s: IBM introduced IMS
36 years old! Legacy technology, but still important!
100,000,000 bank transactions a day move money through IMS system A bank manages over 300,000,000 online bank accounts on IMS One production IMS system has been running for over 8 years without down time or a crash

A brief history of databases

1970: Ted Codd introduced the relational data model
Revolutionary idea that spurred a flurry of DBMS activity at IBM (System R, DB2) at Universities like Berkeley (Ingres) at Oracle (it was born!!)

Ted Codd won the Turing award in 1981 Larry Ellison became a gillionaire

So what s the big deal about the relational data model? What is the first benefit of a DBMS?
Data independence A Data Model is key to data independence
It s the link that provides an abstraction between user s view of the world and bits stored in computer

Student (sid: string, name: string, login: string, age: integer, gpa:real)

1010111101

So what s the big deal about the relational data model?

It is now the most widely used data model. Before 1970, there were other data models
Network Hierarchical (IMS)

But they didn t really provide data independence

If the data layout changed, the application had to change If you wanted to change the layout, you often had to bring the whole system down Changes had to occur over scheduled system down time.
Slow! Annoying! Expensive!

The relational model changed all that.

Relational Database: Definitions

Relational database: a set of relations. Relation: made up of 2 parts:
Schema : specifies name of relation, plus name and type of each column.
e.g. Students(sid: string, name: string, login: string, age: integer, gpa: real)

Instance : a table, with rows and columns.

#rows = cardinality #fields = degree / arity

You can think of a relation as a set of rows or tuples. (It s basically a spread sheet!)
i.e., all rows are distinct

Ex: Instance of Students Relation

sid 53666 53688 53650

name login Jones jones@cs Smith smith@eecs Smith smith@math

age 18 18 19

gpa 3.4 3.2 3.8

Cardinality = 3, arity = 5 , all rows distinct Do all values in each column of a relation instance
have to be distinct?

SQL - A language for Relational DBs SQL (a.k.a. Sequel ), standard language Data Definition Language (DDL)
create, modify, delete relations specify constraints administer users, security, etc.

Data Manipulation Language (DML)

Specify queries to find tuples that satisfy criteria add, modify, remove tuples

SQL Overview
CREATE TABLE <name> ( <field> <domain>, INSERT INTO <name> (<field names>) VALUES (<field values>) DELETE FROM <name> WHERE <condition> UPDATE <name> SET <field name> = <value> WHERE <condition> SELECT <fields> FROM <name> WHERE <condition> )

Creating Relations in SQL Creates the Students relation.

Note: the type of each field is specified, and enforced by the DBMS whenever tuples are added or modified. CREATE TABLE Students (sid CHAR(20), name CHAR(20), login CHAR(10), age INTEGER, gpa FLOAT)

Table Creation (continued)

Another example: the Enrolled table holds information about courses students take. CREATE TABLE Enrolled (sid CHAR(20), cid CHAR(20), grade CHAR(2))

Adding and Deleting Tuples

Can insert a single tuple using: INSERT INTO Students (sid,name,login,age,gpa) VALUES (53688,Smith,smith@ee,18,3.2) Can delete all tuples satisfying some condition (e.g., name = Smith):

DELETE FROM Students S WHERE S.name = Smith

Powerful variants of these commands are available; more later!

Keys
Keys are a way to associate tuples in different relations
Enrolled
sid 53666 53666 53650 53666 cid grade Carnatic101 C Reggae203 B Topology112 A History105 B

Students
sid 53666 53688 53650 name login Jones jones@cs Smith smith@eecs Smith smith@math age 18 18 19 gpa 3.4 3.2 3.8

FOREIGN Key

PRIMARY Key

Keys are the key to data independence! Big improvement over the hierarchical model
Relationships are determined by field value, not physical pointers!

Keys are the key to data independence!

Let s enroll Smith in EECS in CS186
With hierarchical model 53688 Smith smith@eecs 18 3.2

CS186

IMS requires
A change to add a field for CS186 A change to Smith s record to have him point to the new field

Keys are the key to data independence!

Let s enroll Smith in EECS in CS186
With relational model

Enrolled
sid 53666 53666 53650 53666 53688 cid grade Carnatic101 C Reggae203 B Topology112 A History105 B CS186 A

Students
sid 53666 53688 53650 name login Jones jones@cs Smith smith@eecs Smith smith@math age 18 18 19 gpa 3.4 3.2 3.8

Relation model only requires

A data change to add a new row to Enrolled table

Let s return to our bank

Can we apply a relational model to our bank spreadsheet?

Exercises to test your understanding Write the DDL for our bank tables.
Include primary and foreign key definitions

Write a SQL query (DML) that returns the names and account balances for all customers that have an account balance > 2500. Write a SQL query (DML) that withdraws $300 from Frodo s account.