CISC 637: Database Systems

Catalog Description:
Physical and logical organization of databases. Data retrieval languages, relational database languages, security and integrity, concurrency, distributed databases.

Current Texts:
Fundamentals of Database Systems
Navatthe & Elmasri
Benjamin Cummings

Goals:
The course goal is an understanding of the basic principles and issues involved in the design and use of a database system. After completing this course a student should be able to design modules of a database system, write application programs that operate on a database, and understand the design principles, capabilities, and limitations of database systems. (This course emphasizes design of database systems; it is not a survey of current business models.)

Content:

• Physical organization - file structure, storage allocation, search techniques,
• Logical organization - entity-relationship, hierarchical, network, and relational data models,
• Data Retrieval Languages - ISBL, QUEL, Query-by-Example, DL/1, DBTG proposa l,
• Equivalence and properties of relational database languages,
• Design and optimization of relational databases - decomposition, lossless joins, dependency preservation, normal forms,
• Security and Integrity in databases - statistical databases,
• Concurrency control,
• Distributed databases.

Required Background: This course is intended for senior level undergraduate and first year graduate students. A good data structures background is assumed. Therefore CISC 220 is a prerequisite for this course. Many query languages are based on the predicate calculus. Therefore CISC 310 is strongly recommended.

Helpful Background: Familiarity with any database system would be helpful background, as would familiarity with the 'C' programming language, since the latter can be used to write application programs that include calls to the INGRES database system.