Database Management System
Module 2: Serializability
Salim Diwani
College of Informatics and Virtual Education
University of Dodoma
Module Outline:
To understand the issues that arise when two or
more transactions work concurrently.
To introduce the notions of Serializability that
ensure schedules for transactions that may run
in concurrent fashion but still guarantee and
serial behavior.
To analyze the conditions, called conflicts, that
need to be honored to attain Serializable
schedules.
Serializability Concepts
A schedule is a sequence of operations by a set of
concurrent transaction that preserves the order of the
operations in each of the individual transactions.
Serial schedule a schedule where the operations of
each transaction are executed consecutively without
any interleaved operations from other transactions.
Non-serial schedule a schedule of the operations
from a set of concurrent transaction are interleaved.
Serializability Concepts
Serializable Schedule: The objective of serializability is
to find non-serial schedules that allow transactions to
execute concurrently without interfering one another,
and thereby produce a database state that could be
produced by a serial execution.
That means a non-serial schedule is serializable and
correct if it produces same results as some serial
execution.
Serializability Concepts
Basic Assumption – Each transaction preserves
database consistency.
Thus, serial execution of a set of transactions
preserves database consistency.
A (possibly concurrent) schedule is serializable if it is
equivalent to a serial schedule.
Simplified view of transactions
We ignore operations other than read and write instructions.
Other operations happen in memory (are temporary in
nature) and (mostly) do not affect the state of the
database.
This is a simplifying assumption for analysis.
We assume that transaction may perform arbitrary
computations on data in local buffers in between reads and
writes.
Our simplified schedules consist of only read and write
instructions.
Conflicting Instructions
Let Ii and Ij be two instructions Ti and Tj respectively.
Instruction Ii and Ij conflict if and only if there exists some
item Q accessed by both Ii and Ij, and atleast one of these
instructions wrote Q.
1. Ii = read (Q), Ij = read (Q). Ii and Ij don’t conflict
2. Ii = read (Q), Ij = write (Q). They conflict
3. Ii = write (Q), Ij = read (Q). They conflict
4. Ii = write (Q), Ij = write (Q). They conflict
Conflicting Instructions
Intuiitively, a conflict between Ii and Ij forces a (logical)
temporal order between them.
If Ii and Ij are consecutive in a schedule and they do not
conflict, their results would remain the same even if they
had been interchanged in the schedule.
Conflict Serializability
If a schedule S can be transformed into a schedule S’ by a
series of swaps of non-conflicting instructions, we say that
S and S’ are conflict equivalent.
We say that a schedule S is conflict serializable if it is
conflict equivalent to a serial schedule.
Conflict Serializability (Cont.)
Schedule 3 can be transformed into schedule 6 – a serial
schedule where T2 follows T1, by a series of swaps of non-
conflicting instructions.
Swap T1.read(B) and T2.write(A)
Swap T1.read(B) and T2.read(A)
Swap T1.write(B) and T2.write(A)
Swap T1.write(B) and T2.read(A)
Therefore, schedule 3 is conflict serializable:
These swaps do not conflict as they work with different
items (A or B) in different transactions.
Conflict Serializability (Cont.)
T1 T2 T1 T2
Read (A) Read (A)
Write ((A) Write ((A)
Read (A) Read (B)
Write (A) Write (B)
Read (B) Read (A)
Write (B) Write (A)
Read (B) Read (B)
Write (B) Write (B)
Conflict Serializability (Cont.)
Example of a schedule that is not conflict serializable:
T3 T4
Read (Q)
Write (Q)
Write (Q)
We are unable to swap instructions in the above
schedule to obtain either the serial schedule <T3,
T4>, or the serial schedule <T4, T3>
Precedence Graph
Consider some schedule of a set of transactions T1,
T2, T3,…………Tn
Precedence graph
A direct graph where the vetrices are the
transaction (names).
We draw an arc from Ti to Tj if the two transactions
conflict, and Ti accessed the data item on which the
conflict arose earlier.
We may label the arc by the item that was accessed.
Precedence Graph
Example
Testing for Conflict Serializability
A schedule is conflict serializable if and only if its
precedence graph is acyclic.
Cycle detection algorithms exist which take order n2 time,
where n is the number of vertices in the graph.
(better algorithms take order n + e where e is the number
of edges).
Testing for Conflict Serializability
If precedence graph is acyclic, the serializability order can
be obtained by a topological sorting of the graph.
That is, a linear order consistent with the partial order
of the graph.
For example, a serializability order for the schedule (a)
would be one of either (b) or (c).
Testing for Conflict Serializability
Quiz
considerthe following schedule:
W1(A), R2(A), W1(B), W3(C), R2(C), R4 (B), W2
(D), W4 (E), R5(D), W5(E)
07/28/2020 | 19
Than you…!
