Database Management System

Database Management System or DBMS in short refers to the technology of

storing and retrieving users data with utmost efficiency along with appropriate
security measures. This tutorial explains the basics of DBMS such as its
architecture, data models, data schemas, data independence, E-R model,
relation model, relational database design, and storage and file structure and
much more.

Database is a collection of related data and data is a collection of facts and

figures that can be processed to produce information.

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Mostly data represents recordable facts. Data aids in producing information,

which is based on facts. For example, if we have data about marks obtained
by all students, we can then conclude about toppers and average marks.

A database management system stores data in such a way that it

becomes easier to retrieve, manipulate, and produce information.

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Characteristics

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Traditionally, data was organized in file formats. DBMS was a new concept
then, and all the research was done to make it overcome the deficiencies in
traditional style of data management. A modern DBMS has the following
characteristics

Real-world entity A modern DBMS is more realistic and uses real-world

entities to design its architecture. It uses the behavior and attributes too. For
example, a school database may use students as an entity and their age as an
attribute.

Relation-based tables DBMS allows entities and relations among them to

form tables. A user can understand the architecture of a database just by
looking at the table names.

Isolation of data and application A database system is entirely different

than its data. A database is an active entity, whereas data is said to be passive,

on which the database works and organizes. DBMS also stores metadata, which
is data about data, to ease its own process.

Less redundancy DBMS follows the rules of normalization, which splits a

relation when any of its attributes is having redundancy in values. Normalization
is a mathematically rich and scientific process that reduces data redundancy.

Consistency Consistency is a state where every relation in a database

remains consistent. There exist methods and techniques, which can detect
attempt of leaving database in inconsistent state. A DBMS can provide greater
consistency as compared to earlier forms of data storing applications like fileprocessing systems.

Query Language DBMS is equipped with query language, which makes it

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more efficient to retrieve and manipulate data. A user can apply as many and as

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different filtering options as required to retrieve a set of data. Traditionally it

was not possible where file-processing system was used.
ACID

Properties

DBMS

and Durability

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of Atomicity,Consistency, Isolation,

follows

the
(normally

concepts
shortened

as

ACID). These concepts are applied on transactions, which manipulate data in a

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database. ACID properties help the database stay healthy in multi-transactional

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environments and in case of failure.

Multiuser and Concurrent Access DBMS supports multi-user environment
and allows them to access and manipulate data in parallel. Though there are
restrictions on transactions when users attempt to handle the same data item,
but users are always unaware of them.

Multiple views DBMS offers multiple views for different users. A user who is
in the Sales department will have a different view of database than a person
working in the Production department. This feature enables the users to have a
concentrate view of the database according to their requirements.

Security Features like multiple views offer security to some extent where
users are unable to access data of other users and departments. DBMS offers
methods to impose constraints while entering data into the database and
retrieving the same at a later stage. DBMS offers many different levels of

security features, which enables multiple users to have different views with
different features. For example, a user in the Sales department cannot see the
data that belongs to the Purchase department. Additionally, it can also be
managed how much data of the Sales department should be displayed to the
user. Since a DBMS is not saved on the disk as traditional file systems, it is very
hard for miscreants to break the code.

Users
A typical DBMS has users with different rights and permissions who use it
for different purposes. Some users retrieve data and some back it up. The

Administrators Administrators maintain the DBMS and are responsible for

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users of a DBMS can be broadly categorized as follows

administrating the database. They are responsible to look after its usage and by
whom it should be used. They create access profiles for users and apply
limitations to maintain isolation and force security. Administrators also look
after DBMS resources like system license, required tools, and other software
and hardware related maintenance.

Designers Designers are the group of people who actually work on the
designing part of the database. They keep a close watch on what data should be
kept and in what format. They identify and design the whole set of entities,
relations, constraints, and views.

End Users End users are those who actually reap the benefits of having a
DBMS. End users can range from simple viewers who pay attention to the logs
or market rates to sophisticated users such as business analysts.

DBMS - Architecture
The design of a DBMS depends on its architecture. It can be centralized or
decentralized or hierarchical. The architecture of a DBMS can be seen as
either single tier or multi-tier. An n-tier architecture divides the whole
system into related but independent n modules,
independently modified, altered, changed, or replaced.

which

can

be

In 1-tier architecture, the DBMS is the only entity where the user directly
sits on the DBMS and uses it. Any changes done here will directly be done
on the DBMS itself. It does not provide handy tools for end-users. Database
designers and programmers normally prefer to use single-tier architecture.

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If the architecture of DBMS is 2-tier, then it must have an application

through which the DBMS can be accessed. Programmers use 2-tier

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3-tier Architecture

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architecture where they access the DBMS by means of an application. Here

the application tier is entirely independent of the database in terms of
operation, design, and programming.

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A 3-tier architecture separates its tiers from each other based on the
complexity of the users and how they use the data present in the database.
It is the most widely used architecture to design a DBMS.

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Database (Data) Tier At this tier, the database resides along with its query

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processing languages. We also have the relations that define the data and their
constraints at this level.

Application (Middle) Tier At this tier reside the application server and the
programs that access the database. For a user, this application tier presents an
abstracted view of the database. End-users are unaware of any existence of the
database beyond the application. At the other end, the database tier is not
aware of any other user beyond the application tier. Hence, the application layer
sits in the middle and acts as a mediator between the end-user and the
database.

User (Presentation) Tier End-users operate on this tier and they know
nothing about any existence of the database beyond this layer. At this layer,
multiple views of the database can be provided by the application. All views are
generated by applications that reside in the application tier.

Multiple-tier database architecture is highly modifiable, as almost all its

components are independent and can be changed independently.

DBMS - Data Models

Data models define how the logical structure of a database is modeled. Data
Models are fundamental entities to introduce abstraction in a DBMS. Data
models define how data is connected to each other and how they are
processed and stored inside the system.

Entity-Relationship Model

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The very first data model could be flat data-models, where all the data used
are to be kept in the same plane. Earlier data models were not so scientific,
hence they were prone to introduce lots of duplication and update
anomalies.

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Entity-Relationship (ER) Model is based on the notion of real-world entities

and relationships among them. While formulating real-world scenario into
the database model, the ER Model creates entity set, relationship set,

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general attributes and constraints.

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ER Model is best used for the conceptual design of a database.

ER Model is based on

Entities and their attributes.

Relationships among entities.

These concepts are explained below.

Entity An entity in an ER Model is a real-world entity having properties

called attributes.

Every attribute is

defined

by

its

set

of

values

called domain. For example, in a school database, a student is considered as

an entity. Student has various attributes like name, age, class, etc.

Relationship The logical association among entities is calledrelationship.

Relationships are mapped with entities in various ways. Mapping cardinalities
define the number of association between two entities.

one to one

one to many

many to one

many to many

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Mapping cardinalities

Relational Model

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The most popular data model in DBMS is the Relational Model. It is more
scientific a model than others. This model is based on first-order predicate
logic and defines a table as an n-ary relation.

The main highlights of this model are

Data is stored in tables called relations.

Relations can be normalized.

In normalized relations, values saved are atomic values.

Each row in a relation contains a unique value.

Each column in a relation contains values from a same domain.

DBMS - Data Schemas

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Database Schema

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A database schema is the skeleton structure that represents the logical view
of the entire database. It defines how the data is organized and how the
relations among them are associated. It formulates all the constraints that
are to be applied on the data.

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A database schema defines its entities and the relationship among them. It
contains a descriptive detail of the database, which can be depicted by
means of schema diagrams. Its the database designers who design the
schema to help programmers understand the database and make it useful.

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Physical Database Schema This schema pertains to the actual storage of

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A database schema can be divided broadly into two categories

data and its form of storage like files, indices, etc. It defines how the data will
be stored in a secondary storage.

Logical Database Schema This schema defines all the logical constraints
that need to be applied on the data stored. It defines tables, views, and
integrity constraints.

Database Instance
It is important that we distinguish these two terms individually. Database
schema is the skeleton of database. It is designed when the database
doesn't exist at all. Once the database is operational, it is very difficult to
make any changes to it. A database schema does not contain any data or
information.

A database instance is a state of operational database with data at any

given time. It contains a snapshot of the database. Database instances tend
to change with time. A DBMS ensures that its every instance (state) is in a
valid state, by diligently following all the validations, constraints, and
conditions that the database designers have imposed.

DBMS - Data Independence

If a database system is not multi-layered, then it becomes difficult to make

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any changes in the database system. Database systems are designed in

multi-layers as we learnt earlier.

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Data Independence

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A database system normally contains a lot of data in addition to users data.

For example, it stores data about data, known as metadata, to locate and
retrieve data easily. It is rather difficult to modify or update a set of
metadata once it is stored in the database. But as a DBMS expands, it

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needs to change over time to satisfy the requirements of the users. If the
entire data is dependent, it would become a tedious and highly complex
job.

Metadata itself follows a layered architecture, so that when we change data

at one layer, it does not affect the data at another level. This data is
independent but mapped to each other.

Logical Data Independence

Logical data is data about database, that is, it stores information about how
data is managed inside. For example, a table (relation) stored in the
database and all its constraints, applied on that relation.
Logical data independence is a kind of mechanism, which liberalizes itself
from actual data stored on the disk. If we do some changes on table

Physical Data Independence

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format, it should not change the data residing on the disk.

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All the schemas are logical, and the actual data is stored in bit format on

the disk. Physical data independence is the power to change the physical
data without impacting the schema or logical data.

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For example, in case we want to change or upgrade the storage system

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itself suppose we want to replace hard-disks with SSD it should not

have any impact on the logical data or schemas.

ER Model - Basic Concepts

The ER model defines the conceptual view of a database. It works around
real-world entities and the associations among them. At view level, the ER
model is considered a good option for designing databases.

Entity
An entity can be a real-world object, either animate or inanimate, that can
be easily identifiable. For example, in a school database, students,

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teachers, classes, and courses offered can be considered as entities. All

these entities have some attributes or properties that give them their
identity.

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An entity set is a collection of similar types of entities. An entity set may

contain entities with attribute sharing similar values. For example, a
Students set may contain all the students of a school; likewise a Teachers
set may contain all the teachers of a school from all faculties. Entity sets
need not be disjoint.

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Attributes

Entities are represented by means of their properties, called attributes. All

attributes have values. For example, a student entity may have name,
class, and age as attributes.

There exists a domain or range of values that can be assigned to attributes.

For example, a student's name cannot be a numeric value. It has to be
alphabetic. A student's age cannot be negative, etc.

Types of Attributes

Simple attribute Simple attributes are atomic values, which cannot be

divided further. For example, a student's phone number is an atomic value of
10 digits.

Composite attribute Composite attributes are made of more than one

simple attribute. For example, a student's complete name may have first_name
and last_name.

Derived attribute Derived attributes are the attributes that do not exist in
the physical database, but their values are derived from other attributes present
in the database. For example, average_salary in a department should not be
saved directly in the database, instead it can be derived. For another example,
age can be derived from data_of_birth.

Single-value attribute Single-value attributes contain single value. For

example Social_Security_Number.

Multi-value attribute Multi-value attributes may contain more than one

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values. For example, a person can have more than one phone number,

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email_address, etc.

simple single-valued attributes

simple multi-valued attributes

composite single-valued attributes

composite multi-valued attributes

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These attribute types can come together in a way like

Entity-Set and Keys

Key is an attribute or collection of attributes that uniquely identifies an

entity among entity set.
For example, the roll_number of a student makes him/her identifiable
among students.

Super Key A set of attributes (one or more) that collectively identifies an

entity in an entity set.

Candidate Key A minimal super key is called a candidate key. An entity set
may have more than one candidate key.

Primary Key A primary key is one of the candidate keys chosen by the
database designer to uniquely identify the entity set.

Relationship
The association among entities is called a relationship. For example, an
employee works_at a department, a student enrolls in a course. Here,
Works_at and Enrolls are called relationships.

Relationship Set
A set of relationships of similar type is called a relationship set. Like
entities, a relationship too can have attributes. These attributes are
called descriptive attributes.

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Degree of Relationship

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The number of participating entities in a relationship defines the degree of

Ternary = degree 3

n-ary = degree

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Binary = degree 2

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the relationship.

Mapping Cardinalities

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Cardinality defines the number of entities in one entity set, which can be
associated with the number of entities of other set via relationship set.

One-to-one One entity from entity set A can be associated with at most one
entity of entity set B and vice versa.

One-to-many One entity from entity set A can be associated with more than
one entities of entity set B however an entity from entity set B, can be

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associated with at most one entity.

Many-to-one More than one entities from entity set A can be associated with
at most one entity of entity set B, however an entity from entity set B can be
associated with more than one entity from entity set A.

Many-to-many One entity from A can be associated with more than one

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entity from B and vice versa.

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ER Diagram Representation
Let us now learn how the ER Model is represented by means of an ER
diagram. Any object, for example, entities, attributes of an entity,
relationship sets, and attributes of relationship sets, can be represented
with the help of an ER diagram.

Entity
Entities are represented by means of rectangles. Rectangles are named with
the entity set they represent.

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Attributes

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Attributes are the properties of entities. Attributes are represented by

means of ellipses. Every ellipse represents one attribute and is directly
connected to its entity (rectangle).

If the attributes are composite, they are further divided in a tree like
structure. Every node is then connected to its attribute. That is, composite
attributes are represented by ellipses that are connected with an ellipse.

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Multivalued attributes are depicted by double ellipse.

Derived attributes are depicted by dashed ellipse.

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Relationship

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Relationships are represented by diamond-shaped box. Name of the

relationship is written inside the diamond-box. All the entities (rectangles)
participating in a relationship, are connected to it by a line.

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Binary Relationship and Cardinality

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A relationship where two entities are participating is called a binary

relationship. Cardinality is the number of instance of an entity from a
relation that can be associated with the relation.

One-to-one When only one instance of an entity is associated with the

relationship, it is marked as '1:1'. The following image reflects that only one
instance of each entity should be associated with the relationship. It depicts
one-to-one relationship.

One-to-many When more than one instance of an entity is associated with a

relationship, it is marked as '1:N'. The following image reflects that only one
instance of entity on the left and more than one instance of an entity on the
right

can

be

associated

with

the relationship.

It

depicts

one-to-many

relationship.

Many-to-one When more than one instance of entity is associated with the

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relationship, it is marked as 'N:1'. The following image reflects that more than
one instance of an entity on the left and only one instance of an entity on the
right

can

be

associated

with

It

depicts

many-to-one

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relationship.

the relationship.

Many-to-many The following image reflects that more than one instance of
an entity on the left and more than one instance of an entity on the right can be
associated with the relationship. It depicts many-to-many relationship.

Participation Constraints

Total Participation Each entity is involved in the relationship. Total

participation is represented by double lines.

Partial participation Not all entities are involved in the relationship. Partial

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participation is represented by single lines.

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Generalization Aggregation

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The ER Model has the power of expressing database entities in a conceptual

hierarchical manner. As the hierarchy goes up, it generalizes the view of
entities, and as we go deep in the hierarchy, it gives us the detail of every
entity included.
Going up in this structure is called generalization, where entities are
clubbed together to represent a more generalized view. For example, a
particular student named Mira can be generalized along with all the
students. The entity shall be a student, and further, the student is a person.
The reverse is calledspecialization where a person is a student, and that
student is Mira.

Generalization
As mentioned above, the process of generalizing entities, where the
generalized entities contain the properties of all the generalized entities, is
called generalization. In generalization, a number of entities are brought
together into one generalized entity based on their similar characteristics.

For example, pigeon, house sparrow, crow and dove can all be generalized
as Birds.

Specialization

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Specialization is the opposite of generalization. In specialization, a group of

entities is divided into sub-groups based on their characteristics. Take a
group Person for example. A person has name, date of birth, gender, etc.
These properties are common in all persons, human beings. But in a

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company, persons can be identified as employee, employer, customer, or

vendor, based on what role they play in the company.

Similarly, in a school database, persons can be specialized as teacher,

student, or a staff, based on what role they play in school as entities.

Inheritance
We use all the above features of ER-Model in order to create classes of
objects in object-oriented programming. The details of entities are generally
hidden from the user; this process known as abstraction.
Inheritance is an important feature of Generalization and Specialization. It

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allows lower-level entities to inherit the attributes of higher-level entities.

For example, the attributes of a Person class such as name, age, and
gender can be inherited by lower-level entities such as Student or Teacher.

Codd's 12 Rules
Dr Edgar F. Codd, after his extensive research on the Relational Model of
database systems, came up with twelve rules of his own, which according to
him, a database must obey in order to be regarded as a true relational
database.
These rules can be applied on any database system that manages stored
data using only its relational capabilities. This is a foundation rule, which
acts as a base for all the other rules.

Rule 1: Information Rule

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The data stored in a database, may it be user data or metadata, must be a

value of some table cell. Everything in a database must be stored in a table
format.

Rule 2: Guaranteed Access Rule

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Every single data element (value) is guaranteed to be accessible logically

with a combination of table-name, primary-key (row value), and attribute-

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name (column value). No other means, such as pointers, can be used to

access data.

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Rule 3: Systematic Treatment of NULL Values

The NULL values in a database must be given a systematic and uniform
treatment. This is a very important rule because a NULL can be interpreted
as one the following data is missing, data is not known, or data is not
applicable.

Rule 4: Active Online Catalog

The structure description of the entire database must be stored in an online
catalog, known as data dictionary, which can be accessed by authorized
users. Users can use the same query language to access the catalog which
they use to access the database itself.

Rule 5: Comprehensive Data Sub-Language

Rule
A database can only be accessed using a language having linear syntax that
supports data definition, data manipulation, and transaction management
operations. This language can be used directly or by means of some
application. If the database allows access to data without any help of this
language, then it is considered as a violation.

Rule 6: View Updating Rule

All the views of a database, which can theoretically be updated, must also
be updatable by the system.

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Rule 7: High-Level Insert, Update, and Delete

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A database must support high-level insertion, updation, and deletion. This

must not be limited to a single row, that is, it must also support union,
intersection and minus operations to yield sets of data records.

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Rule 8: Physical Data Independence

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The data stored in a database must be independent of the applications that

access the database. Any change in the physical structure of a database
must not have any impact on how the data is being accessed by external
applications.

Rule 9: Logical Data Independence

The logical data in a database must be independent of its users view
(application). Any change in logical data must not affect the applications
using it. For example, if two tables are merged or one is split into two
different tables, there should be no impact or change on the user
application. This is one of the most difficult rule to apply.

Rule 10: Integrity Independence

A database must be independent of the application that uses it. All its
integrity constraints can be independently modified without the need of any
change in the application. This rule makes a database independent of the
front-end application and its interface.

Rule 11: Distribution Independence

The end-user must not be able to see that the data is distributed over
various locations. Users should always get the impression that the data is
located at one site only. This rule has been regarded as the foundation of
distributed database systems.

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Rule 12: Non-Subversion Rule

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If a system has an interface that provides access to low-level records, then

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the interface must not be able to subvert the system and bypass security
and integrity constraints.

Relation Data Model

Relational data model is the primary data model, which is used widely
around the world for data storage and processing. This model is simple and
it has all the properties and capabilities required to process data with
storage efficiency.

Concepts
Tables In relational data model, relations are saved in the format of
Tables. This format stores the relation among entities. A table has rows and
columns, where rows represents records and columns represent the
attributes.

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Tuple A single row of a table, which contains a single record for that
relation is called a tuple.

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Relation instance A finite set of tuples in the relational database system

represents relation instance. Relation instances do not have duplicate
tuples.

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Relation schema A relation schema describes the relation name (table

name), attributes, and their names.
Relation key Each row has one or more attributes, known as relation
key, which can identify the row in the relation (table) uniquely.
Attribute domain Every attribute has some pre-defined value scope,
known as attribute domain.

Constraints
Every relation has some conditions that must hold for it to be a valid
relation. These conditions are called Relational Integrity Constraints.
There are three main integrity constraints

Key constraints

Domain constraints

Referential integrity constraints

Key Constraints
There must be at least one minimal subset of attributes in the relation,
which can identify a tuple uniquely. This minimal subset of attributes is
called key for that relation. If there are more than one such minimal
subsets, these are calledcandidate keys.
Key constraints force that

in a relation with a key attribute, no two tuples can have identical values for key
attributes.

a key attribute can not have NULL values.

Key constraints are also referred to as Entity Constraints.

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Domain Constraints

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Attributes have specific values in real-world scenario. For example, age can
only be a positive integer. The same constraints have been tried to employ
on the attributes of a relation. Every attribute is bound to have a specific
range of values. For example, age cannot be less than zero and telephone

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numbers cannot contain a digit outside 0-9.

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Referential integrity Constraints

Referential integrity constraints work on the concept of Foreign Keys. A
foreign key is a key attribute of a relation that can be referred in other
relation.

Referential integrity constraint states that if a relation refers to a key

attribute of a different or same relation, then that key element must exist.

Relational Algebra
Relational database systems are expected to be equipped with a query
language that can assist its users to query the database instances. There
are two kinds of query languages relational algebra and relational
calculus.

Relational Algebra
Relational algebra is a procedural query language, which takes instances of
relations as input and yields instances of relations as output. It uses
operators to perform queries. An operator can be either unary or binary.
They accept relations as their input and yield relations as their output.
Relational algebra is performed recursively on a relation and intermediate
results are also considered relations.
The fundamental operations of relational algebra are as follows
Select

Project

Union

Set different

Cartesian product

Rename

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We will discuss all these operations in the following sections.

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Select Operation ()
Notation p(r)

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It selects tuples that satisfy the given predicate from a relation.

Where stands for selection predicate and r stands for relation. p is

prepositional logic formula which may use connectors like and, or, and not.
These terms may use relational operators like =, , , < , >, .
For example
subject

= "database"(Books)

Output Selects tuples from books where subject is 'database'.

subject

= "database" and price = "450" (Books)

Output Selects tuples from books where subject is 'database' and 'price'
is 450.

subject

= "database" and price = "450" or year > "2010"(Books)

Output Selects tuples from books where subject is 'database' and 'price'
is 450 or those books published after 2010.

Project Operation ()
It projects column(s) that satisfy a given predicate.
Notation A1, A2, An (r)
Where A1, A2 , An are attribute names of relation r.
Duplicate rows are automatically eliminated, as relation is a set.

author

(Books)

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For example

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Union Operation ()

Selects and projects columns named as subject and author from the
relation Books.

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It performs binary union between two given relations and is defined as

r s = { t | t r or t s}

Notion r U s

Where r and s are either

(temporary relation).

database

relations

or

relation

result

set

For a union operation to be valid, the following conditions must hold

r, and s must have the same number of attributes.

Attribute domains must be compatible.

Duplicate tuples are automatically eliminated.

author

(Books)

author

(Articles)

Output Projects the names of the authors who have either written a book
or an article or both.

Set Difference ()
The result of set difference operation is tuples, which are present in one
relation but are not in the second relation.
Notation r s
Finds all the tuples that are present in r but not in s.

author

(Books)

author

(Articles)

Output Provides the name of authors who have written books but not
articles.

Cartesian Product ()

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Combines information of two different relations into one.

Notation r s

author

= 'tutorialspoint'(Books

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r s = { q t | q r and t s}

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Where r and s are relations and their output will be defined as

Articles)

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Output Yields a relation, which shows all the books and articles written
by tutorialspoint.

Rename Operation ()
The results of relational algebra are also relations but without any name.
The rename operation allows us to rename the output relation. 'rename'
operation is denoted with small Greek letter rho .
Notation

(E)

Where the result of expression E is saved with name of x.

Additional operations are

Set intersection

Assignment

Natural join

Relational Calculus
In contrast to Relational Algebra, Relational Calculus is a non-procedural
query language, that is, it tells what to do but never explains how to do it.
Relational calculus exists in two forms

Tuple Relational Calculus (TRC)

Filtering variable ranges over tuples

Returns all tuples T that satisfies a condition.

Author(T) AND T.article = 'database' }

{ T.name |

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For example

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Notation {T | Condition}

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Output Returns tuples with 'name' from Author who has written article

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on 'database'.

For example
{ R| T

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TRC can be quantified. We can use Existential () and Universal Quantifiers

().

Authors(T.article='database' AND R.name=T.name)}

Output The above query will yield the same result as the previous one.

Domain Relational Calculus (DRC)

In DRC, the filtering variable uses the domain of attributes instead of entire
tuple values (as done in TRC, mentioned above).
Notation
{ a1, a2, a3, ..., an | P (a1, a2, a3, ... ,an)}

Where a1, a2 are attributes and P stands for formulae built by inner
attributes.
For example
{< article, page, subject > |

TutorialsPoint subject = 'database'}

Output Yields Article, Page, and Subject from the relation TutorialsPoint,
where subject is database.
Just like TRC, DRC can also be written using existential and universal
quantifiers. DRC also involves relational operators.

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The expression power of Tuple Relation Calculus and Domain Relation

Calculus is equivalent to Relational Algebra.

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ER Model to Relational Model

ER Model, when conceptualized into diagrams, gives a good overview of
entity-relationship, which is easier to understand. ER diagrams can be
mapped to relational schema, that is, it is possible to create relational
schema using ER diagram. We cannot import all the ER constraints into
relational model, but an approximate schema can be generated.
There are several processes and algorithms available to convert ER
Diagrams into Relational Schema. Some of them are automated and some
of them are manual. We may focus here on the mapping diagram contents
to relational basics.
ER diagrams mainly comprise of

Entity and its attributes

Relationship, which is association among entities.

Mapping Entity
An entity is a real-world object with some attributes.

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Mapping Process (Algorithm)

Create table for each entity.

Entity's attributes should become fields of tables with their respective data types.

Declare primary key.

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Mapping Relationship

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A relationship is an association among entities.

Mapping Process

Create table for a relationship.

Add the primary keys of all participating Entities as fields of table with their
respective data types.

If relationship has any attribute, add each attribute as field of table.

Declare a primary key composing all the primary keys of participating entities.

Declare all foreign key constraints.

Mapping Weak Entity Sets

A weak entity set is one which does not have any primary key associated

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with it.

Mapping Process
Create table for weak entity set.

Add all its attributes to table as field.

Add the primary key of identifying entity set.

Declare all foreign key constraints.

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Mapping Hierarchical Entities

ER specialization or generalization comes in the form of hierarchical entity
sets.

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Mapping Process

Create tables for all higher-level entities.

Create tables for lower-level entities.

Add primary keys of higher-level entities in the table of lower-level entities.

In lower-level tables, add all other attributes of lower-level entities.

Declare primary key of higher-level table and the primary key for lower-level

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table.

Declare foreign key constraints.

SQL Overview

SQL is a programming language for Relational Databases. It is designed

over relational algebra and tuple relational calculus. SQL comes as a
package with all major distributions of RDBMS.
SQL comprises both data definition and data manipulation languages. Using
the data definition properties of SQL, one can design and modify database
schema, whereas data manipulation properties allows SQL to store and
retrieve data from database.

Data Definition Language

SQL uses the following set of commands to define database schema

CREATE

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Creates new databases, tables and views from RDBMS.

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For example

Create database tutorialspoint;

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Create table article;

Create view for_students;

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DROP
For example

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Drops commands, views, tables, and databases from RDBMS.

Drop object_type object_name;

Drop database tutorialspoint;
Drop table article;
Drop view for_students;

ALTER
Modifies database schema.
Alter object_type object_name parameters;

For example
Alter table article add subject varchar;

This command adds an attribute

name subjectof string type.

in

the

relation article with

the

Data Manipulation Language

SQL is equipped with data manipulation language (DML). DML modifies the
database instance by inserting, updating and deleting its data. DML is

SELECT/FROM/WHERE

INSERT INTO/VALUES

UPDATE/SET/WHERE

DELETE FROM/WHERE

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responsible for all froms data modification in a database. SQL contains the
following set of commands in its DML section

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These basic constructs allow database programmers and users to enter data

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SELECT/FROM/WHERE

and information into the database and retrieve efficiently using a number of
filter options.

SELECT This is one of the fundamental query command of SQL. It is similar to

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the projection operation of relational algebra. It selects the attributes based on

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the condition described by WHERE clause.

FROM This clause takes a relation name as an argument from which
attributes are to be selected/projected. In case more than one relation names
are given, this clause corresponds to Cartesian product.

WHERE This clause defines predicate or conditions, which must match in

order to qualify the attributes to be projected.

For example
Select author_name
From book_author
Where age > 50;

This
command
will
yield
the
names
of
relation book_authorwhose age is greater than 50.

authors

from

the

INSERT INTO/VALUES
This command is used for inserting values into the rows of a table
(relation).
Syntax
INSERT INTO table (column1 [, column2, column3 ... ]) VALUES (value1 [, value2, value3 ... ])

Or
INSERT INTO table VALUES (value1, [value2, ... ])

For example
INSERT INTO tutorialspoint (Author, Subject) VALUES ("anonymous", "computers");

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UPDATE/SET/WHERE

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This command is used for updating or modifying the values of columns in a

table (relation).

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Syntax

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UPDATE table_name SET column_name = value [, column_name = value ...] [WHERE condition]

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For example

UPDATE tutorialspoint SET Author="webmaster" WHERE Author="anonymous";

DELETE/FROM/WHERE

This command is used for removing one or more rows from a table
(relation).
Syntax
DELETE FROM table_name [WHERE condition];

For example
DELETE FROM tutorialspoints
WHERE Author="unknown";

DBMS - Normalization
Functional Dependency
Functional dependency (FD) is a set of constraints between two attributes in
a relation. Functional dependency says that if two tuples have same values
for attributes A1, A2,..., An, then those two tuples must have to have same
values for attributes B1, B2, ..., Bn.
Functional dependency is represented by an arrow sign () that is, XY,
where X functionally determines Y. The left-hand side attributes determine
the values of attributes on the right-hand side.

Armstrong's Axioms

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If F is a set of functional dependencies then the closure of F, denoted as F +,

is the set of all functional dependencies logically implied by F. Armstrong's

Reflexive rule If alpha is a set of attributes and beta is_subset_of alpha,

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Axioms are a set of rules, that when applied repeatedly, generates a closure
of functional dependencies.

Augmentation rule If a b holds and y is attribute set, then ay by also

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then alpha holds beta.

holds. That is adding attributes in dependencies, does not change the basic
dependencies.

Transitivity rule Same as transitive rule in algebra, if a b holds and b c

holds, then a c also holds. a b is called as a functionally that determines b.

Trivial Functional Dependency

Trivial If a functional dependency (FD) X Y holds, where Y is a subset of X,

then it is called a trivial FD. Trivial FDs always hold.

Non-trivial If an FD X Y holds, where Y is not a subset of X, then it is

called a non-trivial FD.

Completely non-trivial If an FD X Y holds, where x intersect Y = , it is

said to be a completely non-trivial FD.

Normalization
If a database design is not perfect, it may contain anomalies, which are like
a bad dream for any database administrator. Managing a database with
anomalies is next to impossible.

Update anomalies If data items are scattered and are not linked to each
other properly, then it could lead to strange situations. For example, when we
try to update one data item having its copies scattered over several places, a
few instances get updated properly while a few others are left with old values.
Such instances leave the database in an inconsistent state.

Deletion anomalies We tried to delete a record, but parts of it was left

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undeleted because of unawareness, the data is also saved somewhere else.

Insert anomalies We tried to insert data in a record that does not exist at

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all.

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First Normal Form

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Normalization is a method to remove all these anomalies and bring the

database to a consistent state.

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First Normal Form is defined in the definition of relations (tables) itself. This
rule defines that all the attributes in a relation must have atomic domains.
The values in an atomic domain are indivisible units.

We re-arrange the relation (table) as below, to convert it to First Normal

Form.

Each attribute must contain only a single value from its pre-defined domain.

Second Normal Form

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Before we learn about the second normal form, we need to understand the
following
Prime attribute An attribute, which is a part of the prime-key, is known as a

Non-prime attribute An attribute, which is not a part of the prime-key, is

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prime attribute.

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said to be a non-prime attribute.

holds true.

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If we follow second normal form, then every non-prime attribute should be

fully functionally dependent on prime key attribute. That is, if X A holds,
then there should not be any proper subset Y of X, for which Y A also

We see here in Student_Project relation that the prime key attributes are
Stu_ID and Proj_ID. According to the rule, non-key attributes, i.e.

Stu_Name and Proj_Name must be dependent upon both and not on any of
the prime key attribute individually. But we find that Stu_Name can be

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identified by Stu_ID and Proj_Name can be identified by Proj_ID

independently. This is calledpartial dependency, which is not allowed in
Second Normal Form.

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Third Normal Form

We broke the relation in two as depicted in the above picture. So there

exists no partial dependency.

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For a relation to be in Third Normal Form, it must be in Second Normal form

and the following must satisfy

No non-prime attribute is transitively dependent on prime key attribute.

For any non-trivial functional dependency, X A, then either

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X is a superkey or,

A is prime attribute.

We find that in the above Student_detail relation, Stu_ID is the key and
only prime key attribute. We find that City can be identified by Stu_ID as
well as Zip itself. Neither Zip is a superkey nor is City a prime attribute.
Additionally, Stu_ID Zip City, so there exists transitive dependency.

To bring this relation into third normal form, we break the relation into two
relations as follows

Boyce-Codd Normal Form

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Boyce-Codd Normal Form (BCNF) is an extension of Third Normal Form on

strict terms. BCNF states that
For any non-trivial functional dependency, X A, X must be a super-key.

Zip City

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and

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Stu_ID Stu_Name, Zip

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In the above image, Stu_ID is the super-key in the relation Student_Detail

and Zip is the super-key in the relation ZipCodes. So,

Which confirms that both the relations are in BCNF.

DBMS - Joins
We understand the benefits of taking a Cartesian product of two relations,
which gives us all the possible tuples that are paired together. But it might
not be feasible for us in certain cases to take a Cartesian product where we
encounter huge relations with thousands of tuples having a considerable
large number of attributes.
Join is a combination of a Cartesian product followed by a selection
process. A Join operation pairs two tuples from different relations, if and
only if a given join condition is satisfied.
We will briefly describe various join types in the following sections.

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Theta () Join

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Theta join combines tuples from different relations provided they satisfy the
theta condition. The join condition is denoted by the symbol .

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Notation
R1 R2

R2 = .

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R1 and R2 are relations having attributes (A1, A2, .., An) and (B1, B2,..
,Bn) such that the attributes dont have anything in common, that is R1

Theta join can use all kinds of comparison operators.

Student

SID

Name

Std

101

Alex

10

102

Maria

11

Subjects

Subject

10

Math

10

English

11

Music

11

Sports

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Class

= Subject.Class

SUBJECT

STUDENT Student.Std

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Student_Detail

Name

101

Alex

101

Std

Subject

10

10

Math

Alex

10

10

English

102

Maria

11

11

Music

102

Maria

11

11

Sports

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Class

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SID

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Student_detail

Equijoin
When Theta join uses only equality comparison operator, it is said to be
equijoin. The above example corresponds to equijoin.

Natural Join (

Natural join does not use any comparison operator. It does not concatenate
the way a Cartesian product does. We can perform a Natural Join only if
there is at least one common attribute that exists between two relations. In
addition, the attributes must have the same name and domain.
Natural join acts on those matching attributes where the values of
attributes in both the relations are same.
Courses

Course

Dept

CS01

Database

ME01

Mechanics

EE01

Electronics

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rd

ee

Va

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CID

HoD

Dept

Head

CS

Alex

ME

Maya

EE

Mira

Courses HoD

CS

ME

EE

Dept

CID

Course

Head

CS

CS01

Database

Alex

ME

ME01

Mechanics

Maya

EE

EE01

Electronics

Mira

Outer Joins

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Theta Join, Equijoin, and Natural Join are called inner joins.
includes only those tuples with matching attributes and
discarded in the resulting relation. Therefore, we need to use
include all the tuples from the participating relations in

An inner join
the rest are
outer joins to
the resulting

S)

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Left Outer Join(R

relation. There are three kinds of outer joins left outer join, right outer
join, and full outer join.

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All the tuples from the Left relation, R, are included in the resulting relation.
If there are tuples in R without any matching tuple in the Right relation S,
then the S-attributes of the resulting relation are made NULL.

100

Database

101

Mechanics

102

Electronics

Left

Right

100

Alex

102

Maya

104

Mira

100

Database

101

Mechanics

102

Electronics

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rd

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HoD

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Courses

Right Outer Join: ( R

100

Alex

---

---

102

Maya

S)

All the tuples from the Right relation, S, are included in the resulting
relation. If there are tuples in S without any matching tuple in R, then the
R-attributes of resulting relation are made NULL.
Courses

HoD

100

Database

100

Alex

102

Electronics

102

Maya

---

---

104

Mira

Full Outer Join: ( R

S)

All the tuples from both participating relations are included in the resulting
relation. If there are no matching tuples for both relations, their respective
unmatched attributes are made NULL.
HoD

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Courses

Database

100

Alex

101

Mechanics

---

---

102

Electronics

102

Maya

---

---

104

Mira

ee

100

rd

Pa

DBMS - Storage System

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Databases are stored in file formats, which contain records. At physical

level, the actual data is stored in electromagnetic format on some device.
These storage devices can be broadly categorized into three types

Primary Storage The memory storage that is directly accessible to the CPU

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comes under this category. CPU's internal memory (registers), fast memory
(cache), and main memory (RAM) are directly accessible to the CPU, as they

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are all placed on the motherboard or CPU chipset. This storage is typically very
small, ultra-fast, and volatile. Primary storage requires continuous power supply

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in order to maintain its state. In case of a power failure, all its data is lost.
Secondary Storage Secondary storage devices are used to store data for
future use or as backup. Secondary storage includes memory devices that are
not a part of the CPU chipset or motherboard, for example, magnetic disks,
optical disks (DVD, CD, etc.), hard disks, flash drives, and magnetic tapes.

Tertiary Storage Tertiary storage is used to store huge volumes of data.

Since such storage devices are external to the computer system, they are the
slowest in speed. These storage devices are mostly used to take the back up of
an entire system. Optical disks and magnetic tapes are widely used as tertiary
storage.

Memory Hierarchy
A computer system has a well-defined hierarchy of memory. A CPU has
direct access to it main memory as well as its inbuilt registers. The access
time of the main memory is obviously less than the CPU speed. To minimize
this speed mismatch, cache memory is introduced. Cache memory provides
the fastest access time and it contains data that is most frequently accessed
by the CPU.
The memory with the fastest access is the costliest one. Larger storage
devices offer slow speed and they are less expensive, however they can
store huge volumes of data as compared to CPU registers or cache memory.

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Magnetic Disks
Hard disk drives are the most common secondary storage devices in

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present computer systems. These are called magnetic disks because they
use the concept of magnetization to store information. Hard disks consist of
metal disks coated with magnetizable material. These disks are placed
vertically on a spindle. A read/write head moves in between the disks and is
used to magnetize or de-magnetize the spot under it. A magnetized spot

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can be recognized as 0 (zero) or 1 (one).

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Hard disks are formatted in a well-defined order to store data efficiently. A

hard disk plate has many concentric circles on it, called tracks. Every track
is further divided into sectors. A sector on a hard disk typically stores 512
bytes of data.

Redundant Array of Independent Disks

RAID or Redundant Array of Independent Disks, is a technology to connect
multiple secondary storage devices and use them as a single storage media.
RAID consists of an array of disks in which multiple disks are connected
together to achieve different goals. RAID levels define the use of disk
arrays.

RAID 0
In this level, a striped array of disks is implemented. The data is broken
down into blocks and the blocks are distributed among disks. Each disk
receives a block of data to write/read in parallel. It enhances the speed and
performance of the storage device. There is no parity and backup in Level
0.

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RAID 1
RAID 1 uses mirroring techniques. When data is sent to a RAID controller, it

RAID 2

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sends a copy of data to all the disks in the array. RAID level 1 is also
calledmirroring and provides 100% redundancy in case of a failure.

RAID 2 records Error Correction Code using Hamming distance for its data,
striped on different disks. Like level 0, each data bit in a word is recorded
on a separate disk and ECC codes of the data words are stored on a
different set disks. Due to its complex structure and high cost, RAID 2 is not
commercially available.

RAID 3
RAID 3 stripes the data onto multiple disks. The parity bit generated for
data word is stored on a different disk. This technique makes it to overcome
single disk failures.

RAID 4

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In this level, an entire block of data is written onto data disks and then the
parity is generated and stored on a different disk. Note that level 3 uses

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byte-level striping, whereas level 4 uses block-level striping. Both level 3

and level 4 require at least three disks to implement RAID.

RAID 5
RAID 5 writes whole data blocks onto different disks, but the parity bits
generated for data block stripe are distributed among all the data disks
rather than storing them on a different dedicated disk.

RAID 6
RAID 6 is an extension of level 5. In this level, two independent parities are
generated and stored in distributed fashion among multiple disks. Two
parities provide additional fault tolerance. This level requires at least four

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disk drives to implement RAID.

DBMS - File Structure

Relative data and information is stored collectively in file formats. A file is a
sequence of records stored in binary format. A disk drive is formatted into
several blocks that can store records. File records are mapped onto those
disk blocks.

File Organization

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File Organization defines how file records are mapped onto disk blocks. We
have four types of File Organization to organize file records

Heap File Organization

When a file is created using Heap File Organization, the Operating System
allocates memory area to that file without any further accounting details.
File records can be placed anywhere in that memory area. It is the
responsibility of the software to manage the records. Heap File does not
support any ordering, sequencing, or indexing on its own.

Sequential File Organization

Every file record contains a data field (attribute) to uniquely identify that
record. In sequential file organization, records are placed in the file in some
sequential order based on the unique key field or search key. Practically, it
is not possible to store all the records sequentially in physical form.

Hash File Organization

Hash File Organization uses Hash function computation on some fields of
the records. The output of the hash function determines the location of disk
block where the records are to be placed.

Clustered File Organization

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Clustered file organization is not considered good for large databases. In

this mechanism, related records from one or more relations are kept in the

same disk block, that is, the ordering of records is not based on primary
key or search key.

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File Operations
Update Operations

Retrieval Operations

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Operations on database files can be broadly classified into two categories

Update operations change the data values by insertion, deletion, or update.

Retrieval operations, on the other hand, do not alter the data but retrieve
them after optional conditional filtering. In both types of operations,
selection plays a significant role. Other than creation and deletion of a file,
there could be several operations, which can be done on files.

Open A file can be opened in one of the two modes, read mode orwrite
mode. In read mode, the operating system does not allow anyone to alter data.
In other words, data is read only. Files opened in read mode can be shared
among several entities. Write mode allows data modification. Files opened in
write mode can be read but cannot be shared.

Locate Every file has a file pointer, which tells the current position where the
data is to be read or written. This pointer can be adjusted accordingly. Using
find (seek) operation, it can be moved forward or backward.

Read By default, when files are opened in read mode, the file pointer points
to the beginning of the file. There are options where the user can tell the
operating system where to locate the file pointer at the time of opening a file.
The very next data to the file pointer is read.

Write User can select to open a file in write mode, which enables them to edit
its contents. It can be deletion, insertion, or modification. The file pointer can
be located at the time of opening or can be dynamically changed if the
operating system allows to do so.
Close This is the most important operation from the operating systems point

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of view. When a request to close a file is generated, the operating system

removes all the locks (if in shared mode),

saves the data (if altered) to the secondary storage media, and

releases all the buffers and file handlers associated with the file.

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The organization of data inside a file plays a major role here. The process to
locate the file pointer to a desired record inside a file various based on
whether the records are arranged sequentially or clustered.

DBMS - Indexing
We know that data is stored in the form of records. Every record has a key
field, which helps it to be recognized uniquely.
Indexing is a data structure technique to efficiently retrieve records from
the database files based on some attributes on which the indexing has been
done. Indexing in database systems is similar to what we see in books.
Indexing is defined based on its indexing attributes. Indexing can be of the
following types

Primary Index Primary index is defined on an ordered data file. The data file
is ordered on a key field. The key field is generally the primary key of the

Secondary Index Secondary index may be generated from a field which is a

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relation.

candidate key and has a unique value in every record, or a non-key with

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duplicate values.

Clustering Index Clustering index is defined on an ordered data file. The

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data file is ordered on a non-key field.

Dense Index

Sparse Index

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Ordered Indexing is of two types

Dense Index
In dense index, there is an index record for every search key value in the
database. This makes searching faster but requires more space to store
index records itself. Index records contain search key value and a pointer to
the actual record on the disk.

Sparse Index
In sparse index, index records are not created for every search key. An
index record here contains a search key and an actual pointer to the data
on the disk. To search a record, we first proceed by index record and reach

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Multilevel Index

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at the actual location of the data. If the data we are looking for is not where
we directly reach by following the index, then the system starts sequential
search until the desired data is found.

Index records comprise search-key values and data pointers. Multilevel

index is stored on the disk along with the actual database files. As the size
of the database grows, so does the size of the indices. There is an immense
need to keep the index records in the main memory so as to speed up the
search operations. If single-level index is used, then a large size index
cannot be kept in memory which leads to multiple disk accesses.

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Multi-level Index helps in breaking down the index into several smaller
indices in order to make the outermost level so small that it can be saved in
a single disk block, which can easily be accommodated anywhere in the
main memory.

B+ Tree
A B+ tree is a balanced binary search tree that follows a multi-level index
format. The leaf nodes of a B+ tree denote actual data pointers. B+ tree
ensures that all leaf nodes remain at the same height, thus balanced.
Additionally, the leaf nodes are linked using a link list; therefore, a B + tree
can support random access as well as sequential access.

Structure of B+ Tree
Every leaf node is at equal distance from the root node. A B + tree is of the
ordern where n is fixed for every B+ tree.

Internal nodes
Internal (non-leaf) nodes contain at least n/2 pointers, except the root node.

At most, an internal node can contain n pointers.

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Leaf nodes

Leaf nodes contain at least n/2 record pointers and n/2 key values.

At most, a leaf node can contain n record pointers and n key values.

Every leaf node contains one block pointer P to point to next leaf node and forms
a linked list.

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B+ Tree Insertion

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B+ trees are filled from bottom and each entry is done at the leaf node.

If a leaf node overflows

o Split node into two parts.
o Partition at i = (m+1)/2.
o First i entries are stored in one node.
o Rest of the entries (i+1 onwards) are moved to a new node.
o ith key is duplicated at the parent of the leaf.

If a non-leaf node overflows

o Split node into two parts.

o Partition the node at i = (m+1)/2.

o Entries up to i are kept in one node.
o Rest of the entries are moved to a new node.

B+ Tree Deletion

B+ tree entries are deleted at the leaf nodes.

The target entry is searched and deleted.

o If it is an internal node, delete and replace with the entry from the left

position.
After deletion, underflow is tested,

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If distribution is not possible from left, then

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o If underflow occurs, distribute the entries from the nodes left to it.

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If distribution is not possible from left or from right, then

o Merge the node with left and right to it.

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o Distribute from the nodes right to it.

DBMS - Hashing
For a huge database structure, it can be almost next to impossible to search
all the index values through all its level and then reach the destination data
block to retrieve the desired data. Hashing is an effective technique to
calculate the direct location of a data record on the disk without using index
structure.
Hashing uses hash functions with search keys as parameters to generate
the address of a data record.

Hash Organization

Bucket A hash file stores data in bucket format. Bucket is considered a unit of

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storage. A bucket typically stores one complete disk block, which in turn can

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store one or more records.

Hash Function A hash function, h, is a mapping function that maps all the

set of search-keys K to the address where actual records are placed. It is a

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Static Hashing

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function from search keys to bucket addresses.

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In static hashing, when a search-key value is provided, the hash function

always computes the same address. For example, if mod-4 hash function is
used, then it shall generate only 5 values. The output address shall always
be same for that function. The number of buckets provided remains
unchanged at all times.

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Operation

Insertion When a record is required to be entered using static hash, the hash

rd

function h computes the bucket address for search key K, where the record will

Pa

be stored.
Bucket address = h(K)

Search When a record needs to be retrieved, the same hash function can be
used to retrieve the address of the bucket where the data is stored.

Delete This is simply a search followed by a deletion operation.

Bucket Overflow
The condition of bucket-overflow is known as collision. This is a fatal state
for any static hash function. In this case, overflow chaining can be used.

Overflow Chaining When buckets are full, a new bucket is allocated for the
same hash result and is linked after the previous one. This mechanism is
called Closed Hashing.

Linear Probing When a hash function generates an address at which data is

already stored, the next free bucket is allocated to it. This mechanism is

Pa

rd

ee

Va

ts

called Open Hashing.

Dynamic Hashing
The problem with static hashing is that it does not expand or shrink
dynamically as the size of the database grows or shrinks. Dynamic hashing
provides a mechanism in which data buckets are added and removed
dynamically and on-demand. Dynamic hashing is also known as extended
hashing.
Hash function, in dynamic hashing, is made to produce a large number of
values and only a few are used initially.

ts
Va
p
ee
rd
Pa

Organization

The prefix of an entire hash value is taken as a hash index. Only a portion
of the hash value is used for computing bucket addresses. Every hash index
has a depth value to signify how many bits are used for computing a hash
function. These bits can address 2n buckets. When all these bits are
consumed that is, when all the buckets are full then the depth value is
increased linearly and twice the buckets are allocated.

Operation

Querying Look at the depth value of the hash index and use those bits to
compute the bucket address.

Update Perform a query as above and update the data.

Deletion Perform a query to locate the desired data and delete the same.

Insertion Compute the address of the bucket

o

If the bucket is already full.

Add more buckets.

Add additional bits to the hash value.

Re-compute the hash function.

Else

Add data to the bucket,

If all the buckets are full, perform the remedies of static hashing.

ts

Hashing is not favorable when the data is organized in some ordering and
the queries require a range of data. When data is discrete and random,
hash performs the best.

Va

Hashing algorithms have high complexity than indexing. All hash operations

Pa

rd

ee

are done in constant time.

DBMS - Transaction
A transaction can be defined as a group of tasks. A single task is the
minimum processing unit which cannot be divided further.
Lets take an example of a simple transaction. Suppose a bank employee
transfers Rs 500 from A's account to B's account. This very simple and
small transaction involves several low-level tasks.
As Account
Open_Account(A)
Old_Balance = A.balance
New_Balance = Old_Balance - 500

ts

A.balance = New_Balance

Va

Close_Account(A)

Bs Account

Open_Account(B)

ee

Old_Balance = B.balance
New_Balance = Old_Balance + 500

rd

B.balance = New_Balance

Pa

Close_Account(B)

ACID Properties

A transaction is a very small unit of a program and it may contain several

lowlevel
tasks.
A
transaction
in
a
database
system
must
maintain Atomicity,Consistency, Isolation, and Durability commonly
known as ACID properties in order to ensure accuracy, completeness, and
data integrity.

Atomicity This property states that a transaction must be treated as an

atomic unit, that is, either all of its operations are executed or none. There
must be no state in a database where a transaction is left partially completed.
States should be defined either before the execution of the transaction or after
the execution/abortion/failure of the transaction.

Consistency The database must remain in a consistent state after any

transaction. No transaction should have any adverse effect on the data residing
in the database. If the database was in a consistent state before the execution
of a transaction, it must remain consistent after the execution of the transaction
as well.

Durability The database should be durable enough to hold all its latest
updates even if the system fails or restarts. If a transaction updates a chunk of
data in a database and commits, then the database will hold the modified data.
If a transaction commits but the system fails before the data could be written
on to the disk, then that data will be updated once the system springs back into
action.
Isolation In a database system where more than one transaction are being

ts

executed simultaneously and in parallel, the property of isolation states that all

Va

the transactions will be carried out and executed as if it is the only transaction
in the system. No transaction will affect the existence of any other transaction.

ee

Serializability

When multiple transactions are being executed by the operating system in a

Pa

rd

multiprogramming environment, there are possibilities that instructions of

one transactions are interleaved with some other transaction.
Schedule A chronological execution sequence of a transaction is called a
schedule. A schedule can have many transactions in it, each comprising of a
number of instructions/tasks.

Serial Schedule It is a schedule in which transactions are aligned in such a

way that one transaction is executed first. When the first transaction completes
its cycle, then the next transaction is executed. Transactions are ordered one
after the other. This type of schedule is called a serial schedule, as transactions
are executed in a serial manner.

In a multi-transaction environment, serial schedules are considered as a

benchmark. The execution sequence of an instruction in a transaction
cannot be changed, but two transactions can have their instructions
executed in a random fashion. This execution does no harm if two

transactions are mutually independent and working on different segments

of data; but in case these two transactions are working on the same data,
then the results may vary. This ever-varying result may bring the database
to an inconsistent state.
To resolve this problem, we allow parallel execution of a transaction
schedule, if its transactions are either serializable or have some equivalence
relation among them.

Equivalence Schedules
An equivalence schedule can be of the following types

Result Equivalence

Va

ts

If two schedules produce the same result after execution, they are said to
be result equivalent. They may yield the same result for some value and
different results for another set of values. That's why this equivalence is not
generally considered significant.

ee

View Equivalence

Pa

For example

rd

Two schedules would be view equivalence if the transactions in both the

schedules perform similar actions in a similar manner.

If T reads the initial data in S1, then it also reads the initial data in S2.

If T reads the value written by J in S1, then it also reads the value written by J
in S2.

If T performs the final write on the data value in S1, then it also performs the
final write on the data value in S2.

Conflict Equivalence
Two schedules would be conflicting if they have the following properties

Both belong to separate transactions.

Both accesses the same data item.

At least one of them is "write" operation.

Two schedules having multiple transactions with conflicting operations are

said to be conflict equivalent if and only if

Both the schedules contain the same set of Transactions.

The order of conflicting pairs of operation is maintained in both the schedules.

Note View equivalent schedules are view serializable and conflict

equivalent schedules are conflict serializable. All conflict serializable
schedules are view serializable too.

States of Transactions

Pa

rd

ee

Va

ts

A transaction in a database can be in one of the following states

Active In this state, the transaction is being executed. This is the initial state
of every transaction.

Partially Committed When a transaction executes its final operation, it is

said to be in a partially committed state.

Failed A transaction is said to be in a failed state if any of the checks made

by the database recovery system fails. A failed transaction can no longer
proceed further.

Aborted If any of the checks fails and the transaction has reached a failed
state, then the recovery manager rolls back all its write operations on the
database to bring the database back to its original state where it was prior to
the execution of the transaction. Transactions in this state are called aborted.
The database recovery module can select one of the two operations after a
transaction aborts
Re-start the transaction

Kill the transaction

Committed If a transaction executes all its operations successfully, it is said

to be committed. All its effects are now permanently established on the

rd

ee

Va

ts

database system.

Pa

DBMS - Concurrency Control

In a multiprogramming environment where multiple transactions can be
executed simultaneously, it is highly important to control the concurrency of
transactions. We have concurrency control protocols to ensure atomicity,
isolation, and serializability of concurrent transactions. Concurrency control
protocols can be broadly divided into two categories

Lock based protocols

Time stamp based protocols

Lock-based Protocols

Va

ts

Database systems equipped with lock-based protocols use a mechanism by

which any transaction cannot read or write data until it acquires an
appropriate lock on it. Locks are of two kinds
Binary Locks A lock on a data item can be in two states; it is either locked or

Shared/exclusive This type of locking mechanism differentiates the locks

ee

unlocked.

based on their uses. If a lock is acquired on a data item to perform a write

rd

operation, it is an exclusive lock. Allowing more than one transaction to write on

Pa

the same data item would lead the database into an inconsistent state. Read
locks are shared because no data value is being changed.

There are four types of lock protocols available

Simplistic Lock Protocol

Simplistic lock-based protocols allow transactions to obtain a lock on every
object before a 'write' operation is performed. Transactions may unlock the
data item after completing the write operation.

Pre-claiming Lock Protocol

Pre-claiming protocols evaluate their operations and create a list of data
items on which they need locks. Before initiating an execution, the
transaction requests the system for all the locks it needs beforehand. If all
the locks are granted, the transaction executes and releases all the locks

when all its operations are over. If all the locks are not granted, the
transaction rolls back and waits until all the locks are granted.

Two-Phase Locking 2PL

Va

ts

This locking protocol divides the execution phase of a transaction into three
parts. In the first part, when the transaction starts executing, it seeks
permission for the locks it requires. The second part is where the

Pa

rd

ee

transaction acquires all the locks. As soon as the transaction releases its
first lock, the third phase starts. In this phase, the transaction cannot
demand any new locks; it only releases the acquired locks.

Two-phase locking has two phases, one is growing, where all the locks are
being acquired by the transaction; and the second phase is shrinking,
where the locks held by the transaction are being released.
To claim an exclusive (write) lock, a transaction must first acquire a shared
(read) lock and then upgrade it to an exclusive lock.

Strict Two-Phase Locking

The first phase of Strict-2PL is same as 2PL. After acquiring all the locks in

Va

ts

the first phase, the transaction continues to execute normally. But in

contrast to 2PL, Strict-2PL does not release a lock after using it. Strict-2PL
holds all the locks until the commit point and releases all the locks at a
time.

Strict-2PL does not have cascading abort as 2PL does.

Timestamp-based Protocols

ee

The most commonly used concurrency protocol is the timestamp based

Pa

rd

protocol. This protocol uses either system time or logical counter as a

timestamp.
Lock-based protocols manage the order between the conflicting pairs
among transactions at the time of execution, whereas timestamp-based
protocols start working as soon as a transaction is created.
Every transaction has a timestamp associated with it, and the ordering is
determined by the age of the transaction. A transaction created at 0002
clock time would be older than all other transactions that come after it. For
example, any transaction 'y' entering the system at 0004 is two seconds
younger and the priority would be given to the older one.
In addition, every data item is given the latest read and write-timestamp.
This lets the system know when the last read and write operation was
performed on the data item.

Timestamp Ordering Protocol

The timestamp-ordering protocol ensures serializability among transactions
in their conflicting read and write operations. This is the responsibility of the
protocol system that the conflicting pair of tasks should be executed
according to the timestamp values of the transactions.

The timestamp of transaction Ti is denoted as TS(Ti).

Read time-stamp of data-item X is denoted by R-timestamp(X).

Write time-stamp of data-item X is denoted by W-timestamp(X).

Timestamp ordering protocol works as follows

If a transaction Ti issues a read(X) operation

If TS(Ti) >= W-timestamp(X)

All data-item timestamps updated.

If a transaction Ti issues a write(X) operation

o

rd

Operation executed.

ee

Operation rejected.

Va

ts

If TS(Ti) < W-timestamp(X)

If TS(Ti) < R-timestamp(X)

Operation rejected.

If TS(Ti) < W-timestamp(X)

Pa

Operation rejected and Ti rolled back.

Otherwise, operation executed.

Thomas' Write Rule

This rule states if TS(Ti) < W-timestamp(X), then the operation is rejected
and Ti is rolled back.
Time-stamp ordering rules can be modified to make the schedule view
serializable.
Instead of making Ti rolled back, the 'write' operation itself is ignored.

DBMS - Deadlock
In a multi-process system, deadlock is an unwanted situation that arises in
a shared resource environment, where a process indefinitely waits for a
resource that is held by another process.
For example, assume a set of transactions {T 0, T1, T2, ...,Tn}. T0 needs a
resource X to complete its task. Resource X is held by T 1, and T1 is waiting
for a resource Y, which is held by T2. T2 is waiting for resource Z, which is
held by T0. Thus, all the processes wait for each other to release resources.
In this situation, none of the processes can finish their task. This situation is
known as a deadlock.

Va

ts

Deadlocks are not healthy for a system. In case a system is stuck in a

deadlock, the transactions involved in the deadlock are either rolled back or
restarted.

Deadlock Prevention

ee

To prevent any deadlock situation in the system, the DBMS aggressively

inspects all the operations, where transactions are about to execute. The

Pa

rd

DBMS inspects the operations and analyzes if they can create a deadlock
situation. If it finds that a deadlock situation might occur, then that
transaction is never allowed to be executed.
There are deadlock prevention schemes that use timestamp ordering
mechanism of transactions in order to predetermine a deadlock situation.

Wait-Die Scheme
In this scheme, if a transaction requests to lock a resource (data item),
which is already held with a conflicting lock by another transaction, then
one of the two possibilities may occur

If TS(Ti) < TS(Tj) that is Ti, which is requesting a conflicting lock, is older than
Tj then Ti is allowed to wait until the data-item is available.

If TS(Ti) > TS(tj) that is Ti is younger than Tj then Ti dies. Ti is restarted

later with a random delay but with the same timestamp.

This scheme allows the older transaction to wait but kills the younger one.

Wound-Wait Scheme
In this scheme, if a transaction requests to lock a resource (data item),
which is already held with conflicting lock by some another transaction, one
of the two possibilities may occur

If TS(Ti) < TS(Tj), then Ti forces Tj to be rolled back that is Ti wounds Tj. Tj is
restarted later with a random delay but with the same timestamp.

If TS(Ti) > TS(Tj), then Ti is forced to wait until the resource is available.

ts

This scheme, allows the younger transaction to wait; but when an older
transaction requests an item held by a younger one, the older transaction
forces the younger one to abort and release the item.

ee

Deadlock Avoidance

Va

In both the cases, the transaction that enters the system at a later stage is
aborted.

Pa

rd

Aborting a transaction is not always a practical approach. Instead, deadlock

avoidance mechanisms can be used to detect any deadlock situation in
advance. Methods like "wait-for graph" are available but they are suitable
for only those systems where transactions are lightweight having fewer
instances of resource. In a bulky system, deadlock prevention techniques
may work well.

Wait-for Graph
This is a simple method available to track if any deadlock situation may
arise. For each transaction entering into the system, a node is created.
When a transaction Ti requests for a lock on an item, say X, which is held by
some other transaction Tj, a directed edge is created from Ti to Tj. If
Tj releases item X, the edge between them is dropped and T i locks the data
item.

The system maintains this wait-for graph for every transaction waiting for
some data items held by others. The system keeps checking if there's any

ts

cycle in the graph.

First, do not allow any request for an item, which is already locked by another

Va

Here, we can use any of the two following approaches

ee

transaction. This is not always feasible and may cause starvation, where a

The second option is to roll back one of the transactions. It is not always feasible
to roll back the younger transaction, as it may be important than the older one.

Pa

rd

transaction indefinitely waits for a data item and can never acquire it.

With the help of some relative algorithm, a transaction is chosen, which is to be

aborted. This transaction is known as the victim and the process is known
as victim selection.

DBMS - Data Backup

Loss of Volatile Storage
A volatile storage like RAM stores all the active logs, disk buffers, and
related data. In addition, it stores all the transactions that are being
currently executed. What happens if such a volatile storage crashes
abruptly? It would obviously take away all the logs and active copies of the
database. It makes recovery almost impossible, as everything that is
required to recover the data is lost.
Following techniques may be adopted in case of loss of volatile storage
We can have checkpoints at multiple stages so as to save the contents of the
database periodically.
A

state

of

active

database

in

the

volatile

Va

ts

memory

can

be

periodicallydumped onto a stable storage, which may also contain logs and

<dump> can be marked on a log file, whenever the database contents are

ee

active transactions and buffer blocks.

Pa

Recovery

rd

dumped from a non-volatile memory to a stable one.

When the system recovers from a failure, it can restore the latest dump.

It can maintain a redo-list and an undo-list as checkpoints.

It can recover the system by consulting undo-redo lists to restore the state of all
transactions up to the last checkpoint.

Database Backup & Recovery from Catastrophic

Failure
A catastrophic failure is one where a stable, secondary storage device gets
corrupt. With the storage device, all the valuable data that is stored inside
is lost. We have two different strategies to recover data from such a
catastrophic failure

Remote backup &minu; Here a backup copy of the database is stored at a

remote location from where it can be restored in case of a catastrophe.

Alternatively, database backups can be taken on magnetic tapes and stored at a

safer place. This backup can later be transferred onto a freshly installed
database to bring it to the point of backup.

Grown-up databases are too bulky to be frequently backed up. In such

cases, we have techniques where we can restore a database just by looking
at its logs. So, all that we need to do here is to take a backup of all the logs
at frequent intervals of time. The database can be backed up once a week,
and the logs being very small can be backed up every day or as frequently
as possible.

ts

Remote Backup

Pa

rd

ee

Va

Remote backup provides a sense of security in case the primary location

where the database is located gets destroyed. Remote backup can be offline
or real-time or online. In case it is offline, it is maintained manually.

Online backup systems are more real-time and lifesavers for database
administrators and investors. An online backup system is a mechanism
where every bit of the real-time data is backed up simultaneously at two

distant places. One of them is directly connected to the system and the
other one is kept at a remote place as backup.
As soon as the primary database storage fails, the backup system senses
the failure and switches the user system to the remote storage. Sometimes
this is so instant that the users cant even realize a failure.

DBMS - Data Recovery

Crash Recovery

ts

DBMS is a highly complex system with hundreds of transactions being

executed every second. The durability and robustness of a DBMS depends

ee

Va

on its complex architecture and its underlying hardware and system

software. If it fails or crashes amid transactions, it is expected that the
system would follow some sort of algorithm or techniques to recover lost
data.

rd

Failure Classification

Pa

To see where the problem has occurred, we generalize a failure into various
categories, as follows

Transaction failure

A transaction has to abort when it fails to execute or when it reaches a

point from where it cant go any further. This is called transaction failure
where only a few transactions or processes are hurt.
Reasons for a transaction failure could be

Logical errors Where a transaction cannot complete because it has some

code error or any internal error condition.

System errors Where the database system itself terminates an active

transaction because the DBMS is not able to execute it, or it has to stop

because of some system condition. For example, in case of deadlock or resource

unavailability, the system aborts an active transaction.

System Crash
There are problems external to the system that may cause the system
to stop abruptly and cause the system to crash. For example, interruptions
in power supply may cause the failure of underlying hardware or software
failure.
Examples may include operating system errors.

Disk Failure

ts

In early days of technology evolution, it was a common problem where

hard-disk drives or storage drives used to fail frequently.

Va

Disk failures include formation of bad sectors, unreachability to the disk,

ee

Storage Structure

disk head crash or any other failure, which destroys all or a part of disk
storage.

Pa

rd

We have already described the storage system. In brief, the storage

structure can be divided into two categories
Volatile storage As the name suggests, a volatile storage cannot survive
system crashes. Volatile storage devices are placed very close to the CPU;
normally they are embedded onto the chipset itself. For example, main memory
and cache memory are examples of volatile storage. They are fast but can store
only a small amount of information.

Non-volatile storage These memories are made to survive system crashes.

They are huge in data storage capacity, but slower in accessibility. Examples
may include hard-disks, magnetic tapes, flash memory, and non-volatile
(battery backed up) RAM.

Recovery and Atomicity

When a system crashes, it may have several transactions being executed
and various files opened for them to modify the data items. Transactions

are made of various operations, which are atomic in nature. But according
to ACID properties of DBMS, atomicity of transactions as a whole must be
maintained, that is, either all the operations are executed or none.
When a DBMS recovers from a crash, it should maintain the following

It should check the states of all the transactions, which were being executed.

A transaction may be in the middle of some operation; the DBMS must ensure
the atomicity of the transaction in this case.

It should check whether the transaction can be completed now or it needs to be

rolled back.
No transactions would be allowed to leave the DBMS in an inconsistent state.

ts

Va

There are two types of techniques, which can help a DBMS in recovering as
well as maintaining the atomicity of a transaction
Maintaining the logs of each transaction, and writing them onto some stable

Maintaining shadow paging, where the changes are done on a volatile memory,

rd

ee

storage before actually modifying the database.

Pa

and later, the actual database is updated.

Log-based Recovery
Log is a sequence of records, which maintains the records of actions
performed by a transaction. It is important that the logs are written prior to
the actual modification and stored on a stable storage media, which is
failsafe.
Log-based recovery works as follows

The log file is kept on a stable storage media.

When a transaction enters the system and starts execution, it writes a log about
it.

<Tn, Start>

When the transaction modifies an item X, it write logs as follows

<Tn, X, V1, V2>

It reads Tn has changed the value of X, from V1 to V2.

When the transaction finishes, it logs

<Tn, commit>

The database can be modified using two approaches

Deferred database modification All logs are written on to the stable

storage and the database is updated when a transaction commits.

Immediate database modification Each log follows an actual database

ts

modification. That is, the database is modified immediately after every

Va

operation.

Recovery with Concurrent Transactions

ee

When more than one transaction are being executed in parallel, the logs are
interleaved. At the time of recovery, it would become hard for the recovery

Checkpoint

Pa

rd

system to backtrack all logs, and then start recovering. To ease this
situation, most modern DBMS use the concept of 'checkpoints'.

Keeping and maintaining logs in real time and in real environment may fill
out all the memory space available in the system. As time passes, the log
file may grow too big to be handled at all. Checkpoint is a mechanism
where all the previous logs are removed from the system and stored
permanently in a storage disk. Checkpoint declares a point before which the
DBMS was in consistent state, and all the transactions were committed.

Recovery
When a system with concurrent transactions crashes and recovers, it
behaves in the following manner

The recovery system reads the logs backwards from the end to the last
checkpoint.
It maintains two lists, an undo-list and a redo-list.

If the recovery system sees a log with <Tn, Start> and <Tn, Commit> or just

Va

ts

<Tn, Commit>, it puts the transaction in the redo-list.

If the recovery system sees a log with <Tn, Start> but no commit or abort log

ee

found, it puts the transaction in undo-list.

Pa

rd

All the transactions in the undo-list are then undone and their logs are
removed. All the transactions in the redo-list and their previous logs are
removed and then redone before saving their logs.