CSCU9Q5- Database P&A

Recap: The Database Approach

• Textbook (Ritchie): Chapter 1

CSCU9Q5 • The limitations of the file-based approach can be attributed to two factors:
– The definition of the data is embedded in the programs which are used
rather than being stored separately and independently.
Database Principles and Applications – There is no control over the access and manipulation of data beyond
that imposed by the programs.

• A more effective approach requires two new concepts:

The ANSI-SPARC Architecture
– the Database
– the Database Management System

• A database is a shared collection of logically related data (and a description

of this data), designed to meet the information needs of an organisation.
1 2

Recap: The Database Recap: Logically Related Data?

• A database is a single, large repository of data that is defined once and
• When we analyse the information needs of an organisation we try to
used simultaneously by many users (e.g. in different departments.)
identify entities, attributes, and relationships.
• Rather than having disconnected files with redundant data, all data is • An entity is a distinct object (a person, place or thing, etc.) in the
integrated, with minimum duplication. organisation that must be represented in the database.
• No data is owned by a single department; all data is now a shared corporate – e.g. a Renter, a Property, a Lease Agreement, etc.
resource. • An attribute is a property that describes some aspect of the object that we
• A database holds not only an organisation’s operational data, but also a wish to record.
description (more likely a number of separate descriptions) of that data. – e.g. Rent, Number of rooms, Name, Address, etc.
– The description is known as the database schema or meta-data (the data • A relationship is an association among two or more entities.
about data).
– e.g. Properties have Owners, Renters are associated with a Lease
– This provides a degree of independence between programs and the data Agreement and a Property, etc.
since the structure of the data is separated from the programs and stored • A database combines these aspects: it holds data that is logically related in
in the database.
ways that correspond with the relationships.

3 4

(c) University of Stirling 2016 1

CSCU9Q5- Database P&A

Recap: The Database Management System Recap: The Database Management System
• The Database Management System (DBMS) is the software that enables users • The fact that the database provides a central storage repository for data allows
to define, create, and maintain the database and which provides controlled the DML to provide a general enquiry facility for this data, called a query
access to this database. language.
– Query languages help prevent the problems of either a fixed set of
• The DBMS comes between the users and the database.
operations or a proliferation of programs that occur with file-based
systems.
• First, the DBMS allows users to define the database, usually through a Data
Definition Language (DDL).
• The DBMS provides controlled access to the database.
– The DDL allows users to specify the data types and structures, and the
– Prevents access by unauthorised users.
constraints on the data to be stored in the database.
– Protects integrity of data by maintaining its consistency.
• Second, the DBMS allows users to insert, update, delete, and retrieve data
– Controls access to allow sharing.
from the database, usually through a Data Manipulation Language (DML).
– Facilitates recovery following hardware or software failures.

5 6

Recap: An Abstract View

Recap: The Database Environment
• For example, in the estate agent example we may build an abstract
• A database system aims to provide users with an abstract view of data view which contains the following:
by hiding certain details of how data is stored and manipulated. – Entities: Staff, Property, Owner, and Renter (maybe others, too).
• Therefore, the starting point for the design of a database must be an – Attributes describing properties or qualities of each entity (e.g. Staff have
abstract description of the information requirements of the names, addresses, and salaries).
organisation. This will be in terms of entities, attributes and – Relationships between these entities (e.g. Owners own Properties).
relationships, as we saw before.
• Since a database is a shared resource, we may also be concerned to
• And it will not be concerned at all with the mechanisms which might provide different users with different views of the data held in the
be used to store or retrieve the data. (It is abstract.) database.
• More today: ANSI-SPARC architecture – next!

7 8

(c) University of Stirling 2016 2

CSCU9Q5- Database P&A

The ANSI-SPARC Architecture The Three-Level Architecture - I

• Textbook (Ritchie): Chapter 2
• To satisfy these needs, the architecture of most commercial DBMSs is Users’ view(s) of the database
based on the ANSI-SPARC architecture (1975). External View 1 View 2 View n
– American National Standards Institute (ANSI) level
– Standards Planning And Requirements Committee (SPARC)
Conceptual Conceptual Community view
• Although this never became a formal standard, it is useful to help level Schema of the database
understand the functionality of a typical DBMS.
Physical
• The ANSI-SPARC model of a database identifies three distinct levels Internal Internal
representation of
level Schema
at which data items can be described. the database

• These levels form a three-level architecture comprising: Physical

– an external level, data Database
– a conceptual level, and organisation

– an internal level.

9 10

The Three-Level Architecture - II The Three-Level Architecture -III

• The objective of the three-level architecture is to separate the users’ • 3. The database administrator should be able to change the database
view(s) of the database from the way that it is physically represented. storage structures without affecting the users’ views.
This is desirable for the following reasons: – From time to time rationalisations or other changes to the structure of an
• 1. It allows independent customised user views. organisation’s data will be required.

– Each user should be able to access the same data, but have a different • 4. The internal structure of the database should be unaffected by
customised view of the data. These should be independent: changes to one changes to the physical aspects of the storage.
view should not affect others.
– For example, a changeover to a new disk.
• 2. It hides the physical storage details from users.
• 5. The database administrator should be able to change the conceptual
– Users should not have to deal with physical database storage details. They or global structure of the database without affecting the users.
should be allowed to work with the data itself, without concern for how it
is physically stored. – This should be possible while still maintaining the desired individual
users’ views.
• More ...

11 12

(c) University of Stirling 2016 3

CSCU9Q5- Database P&A

The External Level The Conceptual Level

• The external level represents the user’s view of the database. • The conceptual level describes what data is stored in the database and
– It consists of a number of different views of the database, potentially one the relationships among the data.
for each user.
• It describes the part of the database that is relevant to a particular user. • It is a complete view of the data requirements of the organisation that is
– For example, large organisations may have finance and stock control independent of any storage considerations.
departments. • The conceptual level represents:
– Workers in finance will not usually view stock details as they are more
concerned with the accounting side of things, for example. – All entities, their attributes, and their relationships.
– Thus, workers in each department will require a different user interface to – The constraints on the data.
the information stored in the database. – Security and integrity information.
• Views may provide different representations of the same data.
– For example, some users might view dates in the form (day/month/year) • The conceptual level supports each external view, in that any data
while others prefer (year/month/day). available to a user must be contained in, or derivable from, the
conceptual level.
• Some views might include derived or calculated data.
– For example, a person’s age might be calculated from their date of birth • The description of the conceptual level must not contain any storage-
since storing their age would require it to be updated each year. dependent details.
13 14

The Internal Level Differences between the Levels

• The internal level covers the physical representation of the database on External View 1 External View 2

the computer (and may be specified in some programming language). Sno Fname Lname Age Salary StaffNo Lname Bno

• It describes how the data is stored in the database in terms of particular

data structures and file organisations.
view 1
• The internal level is concerned with: Conceptual Level StaffNo Fname Lname DOB Salary BranchNo
– Allocating storage space for data and indexes.
– Describing the forms that records will take when stored.
– Record placement. Assembling records into files. Struct STAFF {
int StaffNo;
– Data compression and encryption techniques. int BranchNo;
char Fname[15];
• The internal level interfaces with the OS to place data on the storage Internal Level char Lname[15];
devices, build the indexes, retrieve the data, etc. struct date DateOfBirth;
float Salary;
• Below the internal level is the physical level which is managed by the struct STAFF *next; // pointer to next record
OS under the direction of the DBMS. It deals with the mechanics of };
physically storing data on a device such as a disk.
15 16

(c) University of Stirling 2016 4

CSCU9Q5- Database P&A

Database Schemas Mapping Between Schemas

• The overall description of a database is called the database schema. • The DBMS is responsible for mapping between the three types of
schema (i.e. how they actually correspond with each other).
• There are three different types of schema corresponding to the three
levels in the ANSI-SPARC architecture. • It must also check the schemas for consistency.
• The external schemas describe the different external views of the data. – Each external schema must be derivable from the conceptual schema.

– There may be many external schemas for a given database. • Each external schema is related to the conceptual schema by the
external/conceptual mapping.
• The conceptual schema describes all the data items and relationships
between them, together with integrity constraints (later). • This enables the DBMS to map data in the user’s view onto the
relevant part of the conceptual schema.
– There is only one conceptual schema per database.
• A conceptual/internal mapping relates the conceptual schema to the
• At the lowest level, the internal schema contains definitions of the internal schema.
stored records, the methods of representation, the data fields, and
• This enables the DBMS to find the actual record or combination of
indexes.
records in physical storage that constitute a logical record in the
– There is only one internal schema per database. conceptual schema.
17 18

Example of the Different Levels Notes on the Example

External View External View • The two external views are based on the conceptual view.
Sno Fname Lname Age Salary StaffNo Lname Bno
– The Age field is derived from the DOB (Date of Birth) field.
External/Conceptual – The Sno field is mapped onto the StaffNo field of the conceptual record.
mapping
view 1
Conceptual Level • The conceptual level is mapped onto the internal level.
StaffNo Fname Lname DOB Salary BranchNo

Conceptual/Internal • The internal level contains a physical description of the structure for
mapping the conceptual record expressed in a high-level language.
Struct STAFF {
int StaffNo;
• Note that the order of the fields in the physical structure is different
int BranchNo; from that of the conceptual record.
Internal Level char Fname[15];
char Lname[15];
struct date DateOfBirth;
• The physical structure contains a “pointer”, next. This will be simply
float Salary; the memory address at which the next record is stored. Thus the set of
struct STAFF *next; // pointer to next record staff records may be physically linked together to form a chain.
};

19 20

(c) University of Stirling 2016 5

CSCU9Q5- Database P&A

Data Independence -I Data Independence -II

• A major objective of the ANSI-SPARC architecture is to provide data
independence meaning that upper levels are isolated from changes to
External External External
lower levels. Schema Schema Schema
• There are two kinds of data independence:
External/Conceptual Logical data
• Logical data independence refers to the immunity of external schemas mapping independence
to changes in the conceptual schema.
Conceptual
– Changes to the conceptual schema (adding/removing entities, attributes, or Schema
relationships) should be possible without having to change existing
external schemas or rewrite application programs. Conceptual/Internal Physical data
mapping independence
• Physical data independence refers to the immunity of the conceptual
schema to changes in the internal schema.
Internal
– Changes to the internal schema (using different storage structures or file Schema
organisations) should be possible without having to change the conceptual
or external schemas.
21 22

Database Languages The Data Definition Language

• A DBMS typically provides a data sub-language with which the • The DDL is a descriptive language that allows the user to describe and
database and its various schemas can be manipulated. name the entities required and the relationships that may exist between
• Data sub-languages consist of two parts: the different entities.
– Data Definition Language (DDL) • The database schema is specified by a set of definitions expressed in
– Data Manipulation Language (DML) the DDL.
• The DDL is used to specify the database schema and the DML is used
to both update the database and extract information from it. • The DDL may be used only to define a schema or modify an existing
one. It cannot be used to manipulate data.
• They are called sub-languages because they do not include all of the
facilities that one might expect of a high-level language. • Theoretically, there could be a different DDL for each type of database
– i.e. There are no loops or conditional statements, etc. schema (external, conceptual, internal).
• Thus, many systems allow the sub-language to be embedded in a high-
• However, in practice, the DBMS typically provides a single
level language like COBOL, Fortran, Pascal, Ada, or C.
comprehensive DDL that allows specification of at least the external
• Most sub-languages also provide interactive commands that can be and conceptual schemas.
entered directly at a terminal and do not require embedding.
23 24

(c) University of Stirling 2016 6

CSCU9Q5- Database P&A

The Data Manipulation Language Fourth Generation Languages (4GLs)

• The DML is a language that provides a set of operations supporting the • There is no consensus about what constitutes a 4GL.
manipulation of the data held in the database. • It is essentially a shorthand programming language.
• Data manipulation operations usually include: • For our purposes, 4GLs are generally non-procedural in nature.
– Inserting new data or Deleting old data.
• That is, they allow the user to specify what must be done without
– Modifying or Retrieving existing data.
saying how it should be done.
• There are two types of DML which are distinguished by their
– This is very different from using a conventional language like Java (a
underlying data retrieval constructs:
3GL) in which you have to specify how to do things.
• With procedural DMLs, the programmer specifies what data is
– With a 4GL, the how part is determined by the system.
required and how to obtain it.
– In this case, information retrieval is rather like writing a program. • Thus, 4GL tools are usually generators or wizards of some sort.
• With non-procedural DMLs, the user specifies what data is to be – It is a bit like having your program written automatically.
retrieved in a single statement without specifying how the data should • Examples include:
be obtained.
– Form/Report generators
– In this case, the DBMS is responsible for translating the DML statement
into an optimal series of data manipulation operations. – Application generators
25 26

Data Models - I Data Models - II

• A data model comprises three components: • A database schema is usually expressed using the DDL of a particular
DBMS.
– A structural part, consisting of a set of rules according to which databases
can be constructed.
• However, this type of language is too low-level to describe the data
– A manipulative part, defining the types of operations that are allowed on requirements of an organisation in a readily understandable manner.
the data.
– Possibly a set of integrity rules, which ensure that the stored data is • People require a higher-level description of the schema that is
accurate.
organised using the concepts of a particular data model.
• Many data models have been proposed over the years.
– Some are used to describe data at the external and conceptual levels, while • A data model is an integrated collection of concepts for describing
others describe data at the internal level. data, relationships between data, and constraints on the data in an
– Some have greater success than others in hiding from end-users the organisation.
underlying details of the physical storage of data.

27 28

(c) University of Stirling 2016 7

CSCU9Q5- Database P&A

Data Models - III

• Examples:
– Network Model
– Hierarchical Model
– Relational Model
• (Entity-Relationship (ER) Model)
– Object-Oriented Model
– Object-Relational Model
• The first two are older than the others, and by far the majority of
database systems these days are based on the relational model.
• The last two are currently of interest, and are increasingly being used.
As their names suggest, they incorporate the object-oriented approach
to data representation.
• In this course, we concentrate on the relational model.

29

(c) University of Stirling 2016 8