ComPUTeR ScIence

TEXTBOOK FOR CLASS XII

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 12130 – COMPUTER SCIENCE
Textbook for Class XII ISBN 978-93-5292-338-0

First Edition
September 2020 Bhadrapada 1942 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
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October 2022 Kartika 1944 otherwise disposed off without the publisher’s consent,
March 2024 Chaitra 1946 in any form of binding or cover other than that in which
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 FOReWORD

Computer science as a discipline has evolved over the years and has
emerged as a driving force of our socio-economic activities. It has made
continuous inroads into diverse areas — be it business, commerce, science,
technology, sports, health, transportation or education. With the advent
of computer and communication technologies, there has been a paradigm
shift in teaching-learning at the school level. The role and relevance of this
discipline is in focus because the expectations from the school pass-outs
have grown to be able to meet the challenges of the 21st century. Today, we
are living in an interconnected world where computer-based applications
influence the way we learn, communicate, commute or even socialise!
There is a demand for software engineers in various fields like
manufacturing, services, etc. Today, there are a large number of
successful startups delivering different services through software
applications. All these have resulted in generating interest for this subject
among students as well as parents.
Development of logical thinking, reasoning and problem-solving skills
are fundamental building blocks for knowledge acquisition at the higher
level. Computer plays a key role in problem solving with focus on logical
representation or reasoning and analysis.
This textbook focuses on the fundamental concepts and
problem-solving skills while opening a window to the emerging and
advanced areas of computer science. The newly developed syllabus
has dealt with the dual challenge of reducing curricular load as well as
introducing this ever evolving discipline. This textbook also provides space
to Computational Thinking and Artificial Intelligence, which envisaged in
National Education Policy, 2020.
As an organisation committed to systemic reforms and continuous
improvement in the quality of its products, NCERT welcomes comments and
suggestions which will enable us to revise the content of the textbook.

HRUSHIKESH SENAPATY
Director
New Delhi National Council of Educational
August 2020 Research and Training

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2024-
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 PRefACe

In the present education system of our country, specialised or discipline

based courses are introduced at the higher secondary stage. This stage
is crucial as well as challenging because of the transition from general
to discipline-based curriculum. The syllabus at this stage needs to have
sufficient rigour and depth while remaining mindful of the comprehension
level of the learners. Further, the textbook should not be heavily loaded
with content.
Computers have permeated in every facet of life. Study of basic concepts
of computer science has been desirable in education. There are courses
offered in the name of Computer Science, Information and
Communication Technology (ICT), Information Technology (IT), etc., by
various boards and schools up to secondary stage, as optional. These
mainly focus on using computer for word processing, presentation tools
and application software.
Computer Science (CS) at the higher secondary stage of school education
is also offered as an optional subject. At this stage, students usually opt
for CS with an aim of pursuing a career in software development or related
areas, after going through professional courses at higher levels. Therefore,
at higher secondary stage, the curriculum of CS introduces basics of
computing and sufficient conceptual background of Computer Science.
The primary focus is on fostering the development of computational
thinking and problem-solving skills. This book has 13 chapters covering
the following broader themes:
• Data Structure: understanding of important data structure Stack,
Queue; Searching and Sorting techniques.
• Database: basic understanding of data, database concepts, and
relational database management system using MySQL. Structured
query language — data definition, data manipulation and data
querying.
• Programming: handling errors and exceptions in programs written
in Python; handling files and performing file operations in Python.
• Network and Communication: fundamentals of Computers
networks, devices, topologies, Internet, Web and IoT, DNS. Basics
of Data communication — transmission channel, media; basics of
protocols, mobile communication generations.
• Security Aspects: introduction to basic concepts related to network
and Internet security, threats and prevention.
Each chapter has two additional components — (i) activities and (ii)
think and reflect for self assessment while learning as well as to generate
further interest in the learner. A number of hands-on examples are given to
gradually explain methodology to solve different types of problems across
the Chapters. The programming examples as well as the exercises in the
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 vi

chapters are required to be solved in a computer and verify with the given
outputs.
Box items are pinned inside the chapters either to explain related
concepts or to describe additional information related to the topic covered
in that section. However, these box-items are not to be assessed through
examinations.
Project Based Learning given as the end includes exemplar projects
related to real-world problems. Teachers are supposed to assign these or
similar projects to be developed in groups. Working in such projects may
promote peer-learning, team spirit and responsiveness.
The chapters have been written by involving practicing teachers
as well as subject experts. Several iterations have resulted into this
book. Thanks are due to the authors and reviewers for their valuable
contribution. I would like to place on record appreciation for Professor
Om Vikas for leading the review activities of the book as well as for his
guidance and motivation to the development team throughout. Comments
and suggestions are welcome.

New Delhi Rejaul Karim Barbhuiya

20 August 2020 Assistant Professor
Central Institute of
Educational Technology

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 TexTBOOk DevelOPMenT COMMITTee

CHIEF ADVISOR
Om Vikas, Professor (Retd.), Former Director, ABV-IIITM, Gwalior, M.P.

MEMBERS
Anju Gupta, Freelance Educationist, Delhi
Anuradha Khattar, Assistant Professor, Miranda House, University of Delhi
Chetna Khanna, Freelance Educationist, Delhi
Faheem Masoodi, Assistant Professor, Department of Computer Science,
University of Kashmir
Harita Ahuja, Assistant Professor, Acharya Narendra Dev College, University
of Delhi
Mohini Arora, HOD, Computer Science, Air Force Golden Jubilee Institute,
Subroto Park, Delhi
Mudasir Wani, Assistant Professor, Govt. College for Women Nawakadal,
Sri Nagar, Jammu and Kashmir
Naeem Ahmad, Assistant Professor, Madanapalle Institute of Technology
and Science, Madanapalle, Andhra Pradesh
Purvi Kumar, Co-ordinator, Computer Science Department, Ganga
International School, Rohtak Road, Delhi
Priti Rai Jain, Assistant Professor, Miranda House, University of Delhi
Sangita Chadha, HOD, Computer Science, Ambience Public School,
Safdarjung Enclave, Delhi
Sharanjit Kaur, Associate Professor, Acharya Narendra Dev College,
University of Delhi

MEMBER-COORDINATOR
Rejaul Karim Barbhuiya, Assistant Professor, CIET, NCERT, Delhi

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 AcknOWLeDGemenTs

The National Council of Educational Research and Training

acknowledges the valuable contributions of the individuals and
organisations involved in the development of Computer Science textbook
for Class XII.
The Council expresses its gratitude to the syllabus development team
including MPS Bhatia, Professor, Netaji Subhas Institute of Technology,
Delhi;
T. V. Vijay Kumar, Professor, School of Computer and Systems Sciences,
Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi; Zahid Raza, Associate Professor,
School of Computer and Systems Sciences, Jawaharlal Nehru University,
New Delhi; Vipul Shah, Principal Scientist, Tata Consultancy Services,
and the CSpathshala team; Aasim Zafar, Associate Professor, Department
of Computer Science, Aligarh Muslim University, Aligarh; Faisal Anwer,
Assistant Professor, Department of Computer Science, Aligarh Muslim
University, Aligarh; Smruti Ranjan Sarangi, Associate Professor,
Department of Computer Science and Engineering, Indian Institute of
Technology, Delhi; Vikram Goyal, Associate Professor, Indraprastha
Institute of Information Technology (IIIT), Delhi; and Mamur Ali, Assistant
Professor, Department of Teacher Training and Non-formal Education
(IASE), Faculty of Education, Jamia Millia Islamia, New Delhi.
The Council is thankful to the following resource persons for
providing valuable inputs in developing this book — Veer Sain Dixit,
Assistant Professor, Atma Ram Sanatan Dharma College, University of
Delhi; Mukesh Kumar, DPS RK Puram, Delhi; Aswin K. Dash, Mother’s
International School, Delhi; Anamika Gupta, Assistant Professor, Shaheed
Sukhdev College of Business Studies, University of Delhi, Sajid Yousuf
Bhat, Assistant Professor, University of Kashmir, Jammu and Kashmir.
The council is grateful to Prof. Sunita Farkya, Head, Department of
Education in Science and Mathematics, NCERT and Prof. Amarendra P.
Behera, Joint Director, CIET, NCERT for their valuable cooperation and
support throughout the development of this book.
The Council also gracefully acknowledges the contributions of Meetu
Sharma, Graphic Designer cum DTP Operator; Kanika Walecha, DTP Operator;
Pooja, Junior Project Fellow; in shaping this book. The contributions of the
office of the APC, DESM and Publication Division, NCERT, New Delhi, in
bringing out this book are also duly acknowledged.
The Council also acknowledges the contribution of Ankeeta Bezboruah
Assistant Editor (Contractual) Publication Division, NCERT for copy editing
this book. The efforts of Naresh Kumar, DTP Operator (Contractual),
Publication Division, NCERT are also acknowledged.

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 COnTenTs

FOREWORD iii
PREFACE v
CHAPTER 1 EXCEPTION HANDLING IN PYTHON 1
1.1 Introduction 1
1.2 Syntax Errors 1
1.3 Exceptions 3
1.4 Built-in Exceptions 3
1.5 Raising Exceptions 4
1.6 Handling Exceptions 7
1.7 Finally Clause 13

CHAPTER 2 FILE HANDLING IN PYTHON 19

2.1 Introduction to Files 19
2.2. Types of Files 20
2.3 Opening and Closing a Text File 21
2.4 Writing to a Text File 23
2.5 Reading from a Text File 25
2.6 Setting Offsets in a File 28
2.7 Creating and Traversing a Text File 29
2.8 The Pickle Module 32

CHAPTER 3 STACK 39
3.1 Introduction 39
3.2 Stack 40
3.3 Operations on Stack 42
3.4 Implementation of Stack in Python 43
3.5 Notations for Arithmetic Expressions 46
3.6 Conversion from Infix to Postfix Notation 47
3.7 Evaluation of Postfix Expression 49

CHAPTER 4 QUEUE 53
4.1 Introduction to Queue 53
4.2 Operations on Queue 55

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 4.3 Implementation of Queue using Python 56
4.4 Introduction to Deque 59
4.5 Implementation of Deque Using Python 61

CHAPTER 5 SORTING 67
5.1 Introduction 67
5.2 Bubble Sort 68
5.3 Selection Sort 71
5.4 Insertion Sort 74
5.5 Time Complexity of Algorithms 77

CHAPTER 6 SEARCHING 81
6.1 Introduction 81
6.2 Linear Search 82
6.3 Binary Search 85
6.4 Search by Hashing 90

CHAPTER 7 UNDERSTANDING DATA 97

7.1 Introduction to Data 97
7.2 Data Collection 101
7.3 Data Storage 102
7.4 Data Processing 102
7.5 Statistical Techniques for Data Processing 103

CHAPTER 8 DATABASE CONCEPTS 111

8.1 Introduction 111
8.2 File System 112
8.3 Database Management System 115
8.4 Relational Data Model 120
8.5 Keys in a Relational Database 123

CHAPTER 9 STRUCTURED QUERY LANGUAGE (SQL) 131

9.1 Introduction 131
9.2 Structured Query Language (SQL) 131
9.3 Data Types and Constraints in MySQL 133
9.4 SQL for Data Definition 134
9.5 SQL for Data Manipulation 141
9.6 SQL for Data Query 144
9.7 Data Updation and Deletion 154
9.8 Functions in SQL 156
9.9 GROUP BY Clause in SQL 167

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 xi

9.10 Operations on Relations 169

9.11 Using Two Relations in a Query 172

CHAPTER 10 COMPUTER NETWORKS 181

10.1 Introduction to Computer Networks 181
10.2 Evolution of Networking 183
10.3 Types of Networks 184
10.4 Network Devices 187
10.5 Networking Topologies 191
10.6 Identifying Nodes in a Networked Communication 194
10.7 Internet, Web and the Internet of Things 195
10.8 Domain Name System 197

CHAPTER 11 DATA COMMUNICATION 203

11.1 Concept of Communication 203
11.2 Components of data Communication 204
11.3 Measuring Capacity of Communication Media 205
11.4 Types of Data Communication 206
11.5 Switching Techniques 208
11.6 Transmission Media 209
11.7 Mobile Telecommunication Technologies 215
11.8 Protocol 216

CHAPTER 12 SECURITY ASPECTS 223

12.1 Threats and Prevention 223
12.2 Malware 224
12.3 Antivirus 230
12.4 Spam 231
12.5 HTTP vs HTTPS 231
12.6 Firewall 232
12.7 Cookies 233
12.8 Hackers and Crackers 234
12.9 Network Security Threats 235

CHAPTER 13 PROJECT BASED LEARNING 241

13.1 Introduction 241
13.2 Approaches for Solving Projects 242
13.3 Teamwork 243

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13.4 Project Descriptions 245

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 h a pter
C
Exception
1 Handling in
Python

“I like my code to be elegant and efficient. The logic

should be straightforward to make it hard for bugs to hide,
the dependencies minimal to ease maintenance, error handling
complete according to an articulated strategy, and performance
close to optimal so as not to tempt people to make the code messy
with unprincipled optimization. Clean code does one thing well.”
— Bjarne Stroustrup

In this Chapter
» Introduction
» Syntax Errors
» Exceptions 1.1 INTRODUCTION
» Built-in Exceptions Sometimes while executing a Python program, the
» Raising Exceptions program does not execute at all or the program
» Handling Exceptions executes but generates unexpected output or
» Finally Clause
behaves abnormally. These occur when there are
syntax errors, runtime errors or logical errors in
the code. In Python, exceptions are errors that
get triggered automatically. However, exceptions
can be forcefully triggered and handled through
program code. In this chapter, we will learn
about exception handling in Python programs.

1.2 SYNTAX ERRORS

Syntax errors are detected when we have not
followed the rules of the particular
programming language while writing a program.
These errors are also known as parsing errors. On
encountering a syntax error, the interpreter
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does not execute the
program unless we
rectify the errors,
save and

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 rerun the program. When a syntax error is encountered
while working in shell mode, Python displays the name
of the error and a small description about the error as
shown in Figure 1.1.

Figure 1.1: A syntax error displayed in Python shell mode

So, a syntax error is reported by the Python

interpreter giving a brief explanation about the error
and a suggestion to rectify it.
Similarly, when a syntax error is encountered while
running a program in script mode as shown in Figure
1.2, a dialog box specifying the name of the error (Figure
1.3) and a small description about the error is displayed.

Figure 1.2: An error in the script

Figure 1.3: Error dialog box

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1.3 EXCEPTIONS
Even if a statement or expression is syntactically
correct, there might arise an error during its execution.
For example, trying to open a file that does not exist,
division by zero and so on. Such types of errors might
disrupt the normal execution of the program and are
called exceptions.
An exception is a Python object that represents an
error. When an error occurs during the execution of a
program, an exception is said to have been raised. Such
an exception needs to be handled by the programmer
so that the program does not terminate abnormally.
Therefore, while designing a program, a programmer
may anticipate such erroneous situations that may
arise during its execution and can address them by
including appropriate code to handle that exception.
It is to be noted that SyntaxError shown at Figures
1.1 and 1.3 is also an exception. But, all other
exceptions are generated when a program is
syntactically correct.

1.4 BUILT-IN EXCEPTIONS

Commonly occurring exceptions are usually defined
in the compiler/interpreter. These are called built-in
exceptions.
Python’s standard library is an extensive collection
of built-in exceptions that deals with the commonly
occurring errors (exceptions) by providing the
standardized solutions for such errors. On the occurrence
of any built-in exception, the appropriate exception
handler code is executed which displays the reason
along with the raised exception name. The programmer
then has to take appropriate action to handle it. Some
of the commonly occurring built-in exceptions that can
be raised in Python are explained in Table 1.1.

Table 1.1 Built-in exceptions in Python

Name of the Built-
S. No Explanation
in Exception
1. SyntaxError It is raised when there is an error in the syntax of the Python code.
2. ValueError It is raised when a built-in method or operation receives an argument
that has the right data type but mismatched or inappropriate values.
3. IOError It is raised when the file specified in a program statement cannot be
opened.

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4 KeyboardInterrupt It is raised when the user accidentally hits the Delete or Esc key
while executing a program due to which the normal flow of the
program is interrupted.

Figure 1.4 shows the built-in exceptions viz,

ZeroDivisionError, NameEError, and TypeError raised
by the Python interpreter in different situations.

Figure 1.4: Example of built-in exceptions

A programmer can also create custom exceptions to

suit one’s requirements. These are called user-defined
exceptions. We will learn how to handle exceptions in
the next section.

1.5 RAISING EXCEPTIONS

Each time an error is detected in a program, the Python
interpreter raises (throws) an exception. Exception

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handlers are designed to execute when a specific
exception is raised. Programmers can also forcefully
raise exceptions in a program using the raise and assert
statements. Once an exception is raised, no further
statement in the current block of code is executed. So,
raising an exception involves interrupting the normal
flow execution of program and jumping to that part of
the program (exception handler code) which is written
to handle such exceptional situations.
1.5.1 The raise Statement
The raise statement can be used to throw an exception.
The syntax of raise statement is:
raise exception-name[(optional argument)]
The argument is generally a string that is displayed
when the exception is raised. For example, when an
exception is raised as shown in Figure 1.5, the message
“OOPS : An Exception has occurred” is displayed along
with a brief description of the error.

Figure 1.5: Use of the raise statement to throw an exception

The error detected may be a built-in exception or

may be a user-defined one. Consider the example given
in Figure 1.6 that uses the raise statement to raise a
built-in exception called IndexError.
Note: In this case, the user has only raised the exception but
has not displayed any error message explicitly.
In Figure 1.6, since the value of variable length
is greater than the length of the list numbers, an
IndexError exception will be raised. The statement
following the raise statement will not be executed. So
the message “NO EXECUTION” will not be displayed in
this case.

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 As we can see in Figure 1.6, in addition to the
error message displayed, Python also displays a stack
Traceback. This is a structured block of text that
contains information about the sequence of function
calls that have been made in the branch of execution of
code in which the exception was raised. In Figure 1.6,
the error has been encountered in the most recently
called function that has been executed.

Figure 1.6: Use of raise statement with built-in exception

Note: We will learn about Stack in Chapter 3.

1.5.2 The assert Statement

An assert statement in Python is used to test an
expression in the program code. If the result after testing
comes false, then the exception is raised. This statement
is generally used in the beginning of the function or after
a function call to check for valid input. The syntax for
assert statement is:
assert Expression[,arguments]
On encountering an assert statement, Python
evaluates the expression given immediately after
the assert keyword. If this expression is false, an
AssertionError exception is raised which can be
handled like any other exception. Consider the code
given in Program 1-1.
Program 1-1 Use of assert statement

print("use of assert statement")

def negativecheck(number):
assert(number>=0), "OOPS... Negative Number"

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 print(number*number)
print (negativecheck(100))
print (negativecheck(-350))

Figure 1.7: Output of Program 1-1.

In the code, the assert statement checks for the

value of the variable number. In case the number gets
a negative value, AssertionError will be thrown, and
subsequent statements will not be executed. Hence,
on passing a negative value (-350) as an argument, it
results in AssertionError and displays the message
“OOPS…. Negative Number”. The output of the code is
shown in Figure 1.7.

1.6 HANDLING EXCEPTIONS

Each and every exception has to be handled by the
programmer to avoid the program from crashing
abruptly. This is done by writing additional code in
a program to give proper messages or instructions to
the user on encountering an exception. This process is
known as exception handling.
1.6.1 Need for Exception Handling
Exception handling is being used not only in Python
programming but in most programming languages like
C++, Java, Ruby, etc. It is a useful technique that helps
in capturing runtime errors and handling them so as to
avoid the program getting crashed. Following are some

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 of the important points regarding exceptions and their
handling:
• Python categorises exceptions into distinct types so
that specific exception handlers (code to handle that
particular exception) can be created for each type.
• Exception handlers separate the main logic of the
program from the error detection and correction
code. The segment of code where there is any
possibility of error or exception, is placed inside one
block. The code to be executed in case the exception
has occurred, is placed inside another block. These
statements for detection and reporting the exception
do not affect the main logic of the program.
• The compiler or interpreter keeps track of the exact
position where the error has occurred.
• Exception handling can be done for both user-defined
and built-in exceptions.

1.6.2 Process of Handling Exception

When an error occurs, Python interpreter creates an
object called the exception object. This object contains
information about the error like its type, file name and
position in the program where the error has occurred.
The object is handed over to the runtime system so that
A runtime system it can find an appropriate code to handle this particular
refers to the
execution of the exception. This process of creating an exception object
statements given in and handing it over to the runtime system is called
the program. It is a throwing an exception. It is important to note that
complex mechanism when an exception occurs while executing a particular
consisting of program statement, the control jumps to an exception
hardware and
software that handler, abandoning execution of the remaining
comes into action program statements.
as soon as the
program, written in The runtime system searches the entire program
any programming for a block of code, called the exception handler that
language, is put for can handle the raised exception. It first searches for
execution. the method in which the error has occurred and the
exception has been raised. If not found, then it
searches the method from which this method (in which
exception was raised) was called. This hierarchical
search in reverse order continues till the exception
handler is found. This entire list of methods is known
as call stack. When a suitable handler is found in the
call stack, it is executed by the runtime process.
This process of

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executing a suitable handler is known as catching the
exception. If the runtime system is not able to find an
appropriate exception after searching all the methods in
the call stack, then the program execution stops.
The flowchart in Figure 1.8 describes the exception
handling process.

Figure 1.8: Steps of handling exception

1.6.3 Catching Exceptions

An exception is said to be caught when a code that is
designed to handle a particular exception is executed.
Exceptions, if any, are caught in the try block and

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 handled in the except block. While writing or
debugging a program, a user might doubt an exception
to occur in a particular part of the code. Such
suspicious lines of codes are put inside a try block.
Every try block is followed by an except block. The
appropriate code to handle each of the possible
exceptions (in the code inside the try block) are
written inside the except clause.
While executing the program, if an exception is
encountered, further execution of the code inside the
try block is stopped and the control is transferred to
the except block. The syntax of try … except
clause is as follows:
try:
[ program statements where exceptions might occur]
except [exception-name]:
[ code for exception handling if the exception-name error is
encountered]
Consider the Program 1-2 given below:
Program 1-2 Using try..except block

print ("Practicing for try block")

try:
numerator=50
denom=int(input("Enter the
denominator")) quotient=(numerator/denom)
print(quotient)
print ("Division performed successfully")
except ZeroDivisionError:
print ("Denominator as ZERO.... not allowed")
print(“OUTSIDE try..except block”)
In Program 1-2, the ZeroDivisionError
exception is handled. If the user enters any non-zero
value as denominator, the quotient will be displayed
along with the message “Division performed
successfully”, as shown in Figure 1.10. The except
clause will be skipped in this case. So, the next
statement after the try..except block is executed and
the message “OUTSIDE try.. except block” is
displayed.
However, if the user enters the value of denom as
zero (0), then the execution of the try block will stop.
The control will shift to the except block and the
message “Denominator as Zero…. not allowed” will
be displayed, as shown in Figure 1.11. Thereafter, the

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statement following the try..except block is executed
and the message “OUTSIDE try..except block”
is displayed in this case also.

Figure 1.9: Output without an error

Figure 1.10: Output with exception raised

Sometimes, a single piece of code might be
suspected to have more than one type of error. For
handling such situations, we can have multiple except
blocks for a single try block as shown in the Program
1-3.
Program 1-3 Use of multiple except clauses

print ("Handling multiple exceptions")

try:
numerator=50
denom=int(input("Enter the denominator: "))
print (numerator/denom)
print ("Division performed successfully")
except ZeroDivisionError:
print ("Denominator as ZERO is not allowed")
except ValueError:
print ("Only INTEGERS should be entered")
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 In the code, two types of exceptions (ZeroDivisionError
and ValueError) are handled using two except
blocks for a single try block. When an exception is
raised, a search for the matching except block is
made till it is handled. If no match is found, then the
program terminates.
However, if an exception is raised for which no
handler is created by the programmer, then such an
exception can be handled by adding an except clause
without specifying any exception. This except clause
should be added as the last clause of the try..except
block. The Program 1-4 given below along with the
output given in Figure 1.11 explains this.
Program 1-4 Use of except without specifying an exception

print ("Handling exceptions without naming them")

try:
numerator=50
denom=int(input("Enter the denominator"))
quotient=(numerator/denom)
print ("Division performed successfully")
except ValueError:
print ("Only INTEGERS should be entered")
except:
print(" OOPS.....SOME EXCEPTION RAISED")
If the above code is executed, and the denominator
entered is 0 (zero) , the handler for ZeroDivisionError
exception will be searched. Since it is not present, the
last except clause (without any specified exception)
will be executed , so the message “ OOPS. SOME
EXCEPTION RAISED” will be displayed.

Figure 1.11: Output of Program 1-4

1.6.4 try...except…else clause

We can put an optional else clause along with the
try...except clause. An except block will be executed

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only if some exception is raised in the try block. But
if there is no error then none of the except blocks
will be executed. In this case, the statements inside the
else clause will be executed. Program 1-5 along with
its output explains the use of else block with the try...
except block.
Program 1-5 Use of else clause

print ("Handling exception using try...except...else")

try:
numerator=50
denom=int(input("Enter the denominator: "))
quotient=(numerator/denom)
print ("Division performed successfully")
except ZeroDivisionError:
print ("Denominator as ZERO is not allowed")

except ValueError:
print ("Only INTEGERS should be entered")

else:
print ("The result of division operation is ", quotient)

Output:

Figure 1.12: Output of Program 1-5.

1.7 FINALLY CLAUSE

The try statement in Python can also have an optional
finally clause. The statements inside the finally block
are always executed regardless of whether an exception
has occurred in the try block or not. It is a common
practice to use finally clause while working with files
to ensure that the file object is closed. If used, finally
should always be placed at the end of try clause, after
all except blocks and the else block.

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Program 1-6 Use of finally clause

print ("Handling exception using try...except...else...finally")

try:
numerator=50
denom=int(input("Enter the denominator: "))
quotient=(numerator/denom)
print ("Division performed successfully")
except ZeroDivisionError:
print ("Denominator as ZERO is not allowed")
except ValueError:
print ("Only INTEGERS should be entered")
else:
print ("The result of division operation is ", quotient)
finally:
print ("OVER AND OUT")
In the above program, the message “OVER AND OUT”
will be displayed irrespective of whether an exception is
raised or not.
1.6.1 Recovering and continuing with finally clause
If an error has been detected in the try block and the
exception has been thrown, the appropriate except
block will be executed to handle the error. But if the
exception is not handled by any of the except clauses,
then it is re-raised after the execution of the finally
block. For example, Program 1.4 contains only the
except block for ZeroDivisionError. If any other
type of error occurs for which there is no handler code
(except clause) defined, then also the finally clause will
be executed first. Consider the code given in Program
1-7 to understand these concepts.
Program 1-7 Recovering through finally clause

print (" Practicing for try block")

try:
numerator=50
denom=int(input("Enter the denominator"))
quotient=(numerator/denom)
print ("Division performed successfully")
except ZeroDivisionError:
print ("Denominator as ZERO is not allowed")
else:
print ("The result of division operation is ", quotient)
finally:
print ("OVER AND OUT")

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 While executing the above code, if we enter a
non-numeric data as input, the finally block will be
executed. So, the message “OVER AND OUT” will be
displayed. Thereafter the exception for which handler is
not present will be re-raised. The output of Program 1-
7 is shown in Figure 1.13.

Figure 1.13: Output of Program 1-7

After execution of finally block, Python transfers

the control to a previously entered try or to the next
higher level default exception handler. In such a case,
the statements following the finally block is executed.
That is, unlike except, execution of the finally clause
does not terminate the exception. Rather, the exception
continues to be raised after execution of finally.
To summarise, we put a piece of code where there
are possibilities of errors or exceptions to occur inside
a try block. Inside each except clause we define handler
codes to handle the matching exception raised in the
try block. The optional else clause contains codes to
be executed if no exception occurs. The optional finally
block contains codes to be executed irrespective of
whether an exception occurs or not.

SUMMARY
• Syntax errors or parsing errors are detected when
we have not followed the rules of the particular
programming language while writing a program.

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 NOTES
• When syntax error is encountered, Python displays
the name of the error and a small description
about the error.
• The execution of the program will start only after
the syntax error is rectified.
• An exception is a Python object that represents
an error.
• Syntax errors are also handled as exceptions.
• The exception needs to be handled by the
programmer so that the program does not
terminate abruptly.
• When an exception occurs during execution
of a program and there is a built-in exception
defined for that, the error message written in
that exception is displayed. The programmer
then has to take appropriate action and handle it.
• Some of the commonly occurring built-in
exceptions are SyntaxError, ValueError,
IOError, KeyboardInterrupt, ImportError,
EOFError, ZeroDivisionError, IndexError,
NameError, IndentationError,
TypeError,and OverFlowerror.
• When an error is encountered in a program,
Python interpreter raises or throws an exception.
• Exception Handlers are the codes that are
designed to execute when a specific exception
is raised.
• Raising an exception involves interrupting the
normal flow of the program execution and jumping
to the exception handler.
• Raise and assert statements are used to raise
exceptions.
• The process of exception handling involves
writing additional code to give proper messages
or instructions to the user. This prevents the
program from crashing abruptly. The additional
code is known as an exception handler.
• An exception is said to be caught when a code
that is designed to handle a particular exception
is executed.
• An exception is caught in the try block and
handles in except block.

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• The statements inside the finally block are always
executed regardless of whether an exception
occurred in the try block or not.

EXERCISE
1.
“Every syntax error is an exception but every exception
cannot be a syntax error.” Justify the statement.
2. When are the following built-in exceptions raised? Give
examples to support your answers.
a) ImportError
b) IOError
c) NameError
d) ZeroDivisionError
3. What is the use of a raise statement? Write a code to
accept two numbers and display the quotient.
Appropriate exception should be raised if the user enters
the second number (denominator) as zero (0).
4. Use assert statement in Question No. 3 to test the
division expression in the program.
5. Define the following:
a) Exception Handling
b) Throwing an exception
c) Catching an exception
6. Explain catching exceptions using try and except block.
7. Consider the code given below and fill in the blanks.
print (" Learning Exceptions...")
try:
num1= int(input ("Enter the first
number")) num2=int(input("Enter the second
number")) quotient=(num1/num2)
print ("Both the numbers entered were correct")
except : # to enter only integers
print (" Please enter only numbers")
except : # Denominator should not be zero
print(" Number 2 should not be zero")
else:
print(" Great .. you are a good programmer")
: # to be executed at the end
print(" JOB OVER... GO GET SOME REST")

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 NOTES 8. You have learnt how to use math module in Class
XI. Write a code where you use the wrong number of
arguments for a method (say sqrt() or pow()). Use the
exception handling process to catch the ValueError
exception.
9. What is the use of finally clause? Use finally clause in
the problem given in Question No. 7.

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 h a pter
C
File Handling
2 in Python

There are many ways of trying to understand

programs. People often rely too much on one way, which
is called "debugging" and consists of running a partly-
understood program to see if it does what you expected.
Another way, which ML advocates, is to install some means of
understanding in the very programs themselves.
— Robin Milner

In this Chapter
» Introduction to Files
» Types of Files
» Opening and Closing a 2.1 INTRODUCTION TO FILES
Text File
We have so far created programs in Python that
» Writing to a Text File accept the input, manipulate it and display the
» Reading from a Text File output. But that output is available only during
» Setting Offsets in a File execution of the program and input is to be
» Creating and Traversing a entered through the keyboard. This is because
Text File the variables used in a program have a lifetime
that lasts till the time the program is under
» The Pickle Module
execution. What if we want to store the data that
were input as well as the generated output
permanently so that we can reuse it later?
Usually, organisations would want to
permanently store information about
employees, inventory, sales, etc. to avoid
repetitive tasks of entering the same data.
Hence, data are stored permanently on secondary
storage devices for reusability. We store Python
programs written in script mode with a .py
extension. Each program is stored on the
secondary device as a file. Likewise, the data
entered, and the output can be stored
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permanently into a file.

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 So, what is a file? A file is a named location on a
secondary storage media where data are permanently
Text files contain stored for later access.
only the ASCII
equivalent of the
contents of the 2.2. TYPES OF FILES
file whereas a
Computers store every file as a collection of 0s and 1s
.docx file contains
many additional i.e., in binary form. Therefore, every file is basically
information like just a series of bytes stored one after the other. There
the author's name, are mainly two types of data files — text file and
page settings, font binary file. A text file consists of human readable
type and size, date characters, which can be opened by any text editor. On
of creation and
the other hand, binary files are made up of non-human
modification, etc.
readable characters and symbols, which require specific
programs to access its contents.
2.2.1 Text file
A text file can be understood as a sequence of characters
consisting of alphabets, numbers and other special
symbols. Files with extensions like .txt, .py, .csv, etc.
are some examples of text files. When we open a text file
using a text editor (e.g., Notepad), we see several lines
of text. However, the file contents are not stored in such
a way internally. Rather, they are stored in sequence
of bytes consisting of 0s and 1s. In ASCII, UNICODE or
Activity 2.1
any other encoding scheme, the value of each character
Create a text file using of the text file is stored as bytes. So, while opening a
notepad and write text file, the text editor translates each ASCII value
your name and save it.
Now, create a .docx file and shows us the equivalent character that is readable
using Microsoft Word by the human being. For example, the ASCII value 65
and write your name (binary equivalent 1000001) will be displayed by a text
and save it as well. editor as the letter ‘A’ since the number 65 in ASCII
Check and compare character set represents ‘A’.
the file size of both the
files. You will find that Each line of a text file is terminated by a special
the size of .txt file is character, called the End of Line (EOL). For example,
in bytes whereas the default EOL character in Python is the newline (\
that of .docx is in
KBs. n). However, other characters can be used to indicate
EOL. When a text editor or a program interpreter
encounters the ASCII equivalent of the EOL character,
it displays the remaining file contents starting from a
new line. Contents in a text file are usually separated
by whitespace, but comma (,) and tab (\t) are also
commonly used to separate values in a text file.

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2.2.2 Binary Files
Binary files are also stored in terms of bytes (0s and 1s),
but unlike text files, these bytes do not represent the
ASCII values of characters. Rather, they represent the
actual content such as image, audio, video, compressed
versions of other files, executable files, etc. These files
are not human readable. Thus, trying to open a binary
file using a text editor will show some garbage values.
We need specific software to read or write the contents
of a binary file.
Binary files are stored in a computer in a sequence
of bytes. Even a single bit change can corrupt the file
and make it unreadable to the supporting application.
Also, it is difficult to remove any error which may occur
in the binary file as the stored contents are not human
readable. We can read and write both text and binary
files through Python programs.

2.3 OPENING AND CLOSING A TEXT FILE

In real world applications, computer programs deal
with data coming from different sources like
databases, CSV files, HTML, XML, JSON, etc. We broadly
access files either to write or read data from it. But
operations on files include creating and opening a file,
writing data in a file, traversing a file, reading data
from a file and so on. Python has the io module that
contains different functions for handling files.
2.3.1 Opening a file
To open a file in Python, we use the open() function. The
syntax of open() is as follows:
file_object= open(file_name, access_mode) The file_object
This function returns a file object called file handle establishes a
which is stored in the variable file_object. We can link between the
program and the
use this variable to transfer data to and from the file data file stored
(read and write) by calling the functions defined in the in the permanent
storage.
Python’s io module. If the file does not exist, the above
statement creates a new empty file and assigns it the
name we specify in the statement.
The file_object has certain attributes that tells
us basic information about the file, such as:
• <file.closed> returns true if the file is closed
and false otherwise.

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 • <file.mode> returns the access mode in which the
file was opened.
Activity 2.2 • <file.name> returns the name of the file.
Some of the other The file_name should be the name of the file that
file access modes are
<rb+>, <wb>, <w+>,
has to be opened. If the file is not in the current working
<ab>, <ab+>. Find out directory, then we need to specify the complete path of
for what purpose each the file along with its name.
of these are used.
The access_mode is an optional argument that
Also, find the file
offset positions in represents the mode in which the file has to be accessed
each case. by the program. It is also referred to as processing mode.
Here mode means the operation for which the file has
to be opened like <r> for reading, <w> for writing, <+>
for both reading and writing, <a> for appending at the
end of an existing file. The default is the read mode. In
addition, we can specify whether the file will be handled
as binary (<b>) or text mode. By default, files are opened
in text mode that means strings can be read or written.
Files containing non-textual data are opened in binary
mode that means read/write are performed in terms of
bytes. Table 2.1 lists various file access modes that can
be used with the open() method. The file offset position
in the table refers to the position of the file object when
the file is opened in a particular mode.
Table 2.1 File Open Modes

File Mode Description File Offset position

<r> Opens the file in read-only mode. Beginning of the file

<rb> Opens the file in binary and read-only mode. Beginning of the file
<r+> or <+r> Opens the file in both read and write mode. Beginning of the file
<w> Opens the file in write mode. If the file already exists, all the Beginning of the file
contents will be overwritten. If the file doesn’t exist, then a
new file will be created.
<wb+> or Opens the file in read,write and binary mode. If the file Beginning of the file
<+wb> already exists, the contents will be overwritten. If the file
doesn’t exist, then a new file will be created.

<a> Opens the file in append mode. If the file doesn’t exist, then End of the file
a new file will be created.

<a+> or <+a> Opens the file in append and read mode. If the file doesn’t End of the file
exist, then it will create a new file.

Consider the following example.

myObject=open(“myfile.txt”, “a+”)

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 In the above statement, the file myfile.txt is opened
NOTES
in append and read modes. The file object will be at the
end of the file. That means we can write data at the
end of the file and at the same time we can also read
data from the file using the file object named myObject.
2.3.2 Closing a file
Once we are done with the read/write operations on a
file, it is a good practice to close the file. Python provides
a close() method to do so. While closing a file, the
system frees the memory allocated to it. The syntax of
close() is:
file_object.close()
Here, file_object is the object that was returned while
opening the file.
Python makes sure that any unwritten or unsaved
data is flushed off (written) to the file before it is
closed. Hence, it is always advised to close the file once
our work is done. Also, if the file object is re-assigned
to some other file, the previous file is automatically
closed.
2.3.3 Opening a file using with clause
In Python, we can also open a file using with clause.
The syntax of with clause is:
with open (file_name, access_mode) as file_
object:
The advantage of using with clause is that any file
that is opened using this clause is closed automatically,
once the control comes outside the with clause. In
case the user forgets to close the file explicitly or if an
exception occurs, the file is closed automatically. Also,
it provides a simpler syntax.
with open(“myfile.txt”,”r+”) as myObject:
content = myObject.read()
Here, we don’t have to close the file explicitly
using close() statement. Python will automatically
close the file.

2.4 WRITING TO A TEXT FILE

For writing to a file, we first need to open it in write or
append mode. If we open an existing file in write mode,
the previous data will be erased, and the file object will
be positioned at the beginning of the file. On the other

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 hand, in append mode, new data will be added at the
For a newly created end of the previous data as the file object is at the end of
file, is there any the file. After opening the file, we can use the following
difference between methods to write data in the file.
write() and append()
methods? • write() - for writing a single string
• writelines() - for writing a sequence of strings

2.4.1 The write() method

write() method takes a string as an argument and writes
it to the text file. It returns the number of characters
being written on single execution of the write()
method. Also, we need to add a newline character (\n)
at the end of every sentence to mark the end of line.
Consider the following piece of code:
>>> myobject=open("myfile.txt",'w')
>>> myobject.write("Hey I have started
#using files in Python\n")
41
>>> myobject.close()
On execution, write() returns the number of
characters written on to the file. Hence, 41, which is the
length of the string passed as an argument, is
displayed.
Note: ‘\n’ is treated as a single character
If numeric data are to be written to a text file, the
We can also use data need to be converted into string before writing to
the flush() method the file. For example:
to clear the buffer
>>>myobject=open("myfile.txt",'w')
and write contents
in buffer to the >>> marks=58
file. This is how #number 58 is converted to a string using
programmers can #str()
forcefully write >>> myobject.write(str(marks))
to the file as and
when required. 2
>>>myobject.close()
The write() actually writes data onto a buffer.
When the close() method is executed, the contents from
this buffer are moved to the file located on the
permanent storage.
2.4.2 The writelines() method
This method is used to write multiple strings to a file.
We need to pass an iterable object like lists, tuple, etc.
containing strings to the writelines() method.
Unlike
24 COMPUTER SCIENCE - CLASS XII
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write(), the writelines() method does not return the Activity 2.3
number of characters written in the file. The following Run the above code
code explains the use of writelines(). by replacing
>>> myobject=open("myfile.txt",'w') writelines() with
write() and see
>>> lines = ["Hello everyone\n", "Writing what happens.
#multiline strings\n", "This is the
#third line"]
>>> myobject.writelines(lines)
>>>myobject.close()
On opening myfile.txt, using notepad, its content will
Can we pass a
appear as shown in Figure 2.1.
tuple of numbers
as an argument to
writelines()? Will it be
written to the file or an
error will be generated?

Figure 2.1: Contents of myfile.txt

2.5 READING FROM A TEXT FILE

We can write a program to read the contents of a file.
Before reading a file, we must make sure that the file is
opened in “r”, “r+”, “w+” or “a+” mode. There are three
ways to read the contents of a file:
2.5.1 The read() method
This method is used to read a specified number of bytes
of data from a data file. The syntax of read() method is:
file_object.read(n)

Consider the following set of statements to

understand the usage of read() method:
>>>myobject=open("myfile.txt",'r')
>>> myobject.read(10)
'Hello ever'
>>> myobject.close()
If no argument or a negative number is specified in
read(), the entire file content is read. For example,
>>> myobject=open("myfile.txt",'r')
>>> print(myobject.read())
Hello everyone
Writing multiline strings
This is the third line
>>> myobject.close()

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 2.5.2 The readline([n]) method
This method reads one complete line from a file where
each line terminates with a newline (\n) character. It
can also be used to read a specified number (n) of bytes
of data from a file but maximum up to the newline
character (\n). In the following example, the second
statement reads the first ten characters of the first line
of the text file and displays them on the screen.
>>> myobject=open("myfile.txt",'r')
>>> myobject.readline(10)
'Hello ever'
>>> myobject.close()
If no argument or a negative number is specified, it
reads a complete line and returns string.
>>>myobject=open("myfile.txt",'r')
Activity 2.4
>>> print (myobject.readline())
Create a file having
multiline data and 'Hello everyone\n'
use readline() with an To read the entire file line by line using the readline(),
iterator to read the
contents of the
we can use a loop. This process is known as looping/
file line by line iterating over a file object. It returns an empty string
when EOF is reached.
2.5.3 The readlines() method
The method reads all the lines and returns the lines
along with newline as a list of strings. The following
example uses readlines() to read data from the text file
myfile.txt.
>>> myobject=open("myfile.txt", 'r')
>>> print(myobject.readlines())
['Hello everyone\n', 'Writing multiline
strings\n', 'This is the third line']
>>> myobject.close()
As shown in the above output, when we read a
file using readlines() function, lines in the file become
members of a list, where each list element ends with a
newline character (‘\n’).
In case we want to display each word of a line
separately as an element of a list, then we can use split()
function. The following code demonstrates the use of
split() function.
>>> myobject=open("myfile.txt",'r')
>>> d=myobject.readlines()

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 >>> for line in d:
words=line.split()
print(words)

['Hello', 'everyone']
['Writing', 'multiline', 'strings']
['This', 'is', 'the', 'third', 'line']
In the output, each string is returned as elements
of a list. However, if splitlines() is used instead of split(),
then each line is returned as element of a list, as shown
in the output below:
>>> for line in d:
words=line.splitlines()
print(words)

['Hello everyone']
['Writing multiline strings']
['This is the third line']
Let us now write a program that accepts a string
from the user and writes it to a text file. Thereafter,
the same program reads the text file and displays it on
the screen.
Program 2-1 Writing and reading to a text file

fobject=open("testfile.txt","w") # creating a data file

sentence=input("Enter the contents to be written in the file:
") fobject.write(sentence) # Writing data to the file
fobject.close() # Closing a file

print("Now reading the contents of the file: ")

fobject=open("testfile.txt","r")
#looping over the file object to read the file
for str in fobject:
print(str)
fobject.close()

In Program 2.1, the file named testfile.txt is opened

in write mode and the file handle named fobject is
returned. The string is accepted from the user and
written in the file using write(). Then the file is closed
and again opened in read mode. Data is read from the
file and displayed till the end of file is reached.

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 Output of Program 2-1:
>>>
RESTART: Path_to_file\Program2-1.py
Enter the contents to be written in the file:
roll_numbers = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6]
Now reading the contents of the file:
roll_numbers = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6]
>>>

2.6 SETTING OFFSETS IN A FILE

The functions that we have learnt till now are used to
access the data sequentially from a file. But if we want
to access data in a random fashion, then Python gives
us seek() and tell() functions to do so.
2.6.1 The tell() method
This function returns an integer that specifies the
current position of the file object in the file. The position
so specified is the byte position from the beginning of
the file till the current position of the file object. The
syntax of using tell() is:
file_object.tell()

2.6.2 The seek() method

This method is used to position the file object at a
particular position in a file. The syntax of seek() is:
file_object.seek(offset [, reference_point])
Does the seek()
function work in In the above syntax, offset is the number of bytes by
the same manner which the file object is to be moved. reference_point
for text and binary indicates the starting position of the file object. That is,
files? with reference to which position, the offset has to be
counted. It can have any of the following values:
0 - beginning of the file
1 - current position of the file
2 - end of file
By default, the value of reference_point is 0, i.e.
the offset is counted from the beginning of the file. For
example, the statement fileObject.seek(5,0)
will position the file object at 5th byte position from the
beginning of the file. The code in Program 2-2 below
demonstrates the usage of seek() and tell().

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Program 2-2 Application of seek() and tell()

print("Learning to move the file object")

fileobject=open("testfile.txt","r+")
str=fileobject.read()
print(str)
print("Initially, the position of the file object is: ",fileobject.
tell())
fileobject.seek(0)
print("Now the file object is at the beginning of the file:
",fileobject.tell())
fileobject.seek(10)
print("We are moving to 10th byte position from the beginning of
file")
print("The position of the file object is at", fileobject.tell())
str=fileobject.read()
print(str)

Output of Program 2-2:

>>>
RESTART: Path_to_file\Program2-2.py
Learning to move the file object
roll_numbers = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6]
Initially, the position of the file object is: 33
Now the file object is at the beginning of the file: 0
We are moving to 10th byte position from the beginning of file

The position of the file object is at 10

rs = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6]
>>>

2.7 CREATING AND TRAVERSING A TEXT FILE

Having learnt various methods that help us to open
and close a file, read and write data in a text file, find
the position of the file object and move the file object
at a desired location, let us now perform some basic
operations on a text file. To perform these operations,
let us assume that we will be working with practice.txt.

2.7.1 Creating a file and writing data

To create a text file, we use the open() method and
provide the filename and the mode. If the file already
exists with the same name, the open() function will
behave differently depending on the mode (write or
append) used. If it is in write mode (w), then all the
existing contents of file will be lost, and an empty file
will be created with the same name. But, if the file is

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 created in append mode (a), then the new data will be
written after the existing data. In both cases, if the file
does not exist, then a new empty file will be created. In
Program 2-3, a file, practice.txt is opened in write (w)
mode and three sentences are stored in it as shown in
the output screen that follows it
Program 2-3 To create a text file and write data in it

# program to create a text file and add data

fileobject=open("practice.txt","w+")
while True:
data= input("Enter data to save in the text file: ")
fileobject.write(data)
ans=input("Do you wish to enter more data?(y/n): ")
if ans=='n': break
fileobject.close()
Output of Program 2-3:
>>>
RESTART: Path_to_file\Program2-3.py
Enter data to save in the text file: I am interested to learn about
Computer Science
Do you wish to enter more data?(y/n): y
Enter data to save in the text file: Python is easy to learn
Do you wish to enter more data?(y/n): n
>>>
2.7.2 Traversing a file and displaying data
To read and display data that is stored in a text file, we
will refer to the previous example where we have created
the file practice.txt. The file will be opened in read mode
and reading will begin from the beginning of the file.
Program 2-4 To display data from a text file
fileobject=open("practice.txt","r")
str = fileobject.readline()
while str:
print(str)
str=fileobject.readline()
fileobject.close()
In Program 2-4, the readline() is used in the while
loop to read the data line by line from the text file. The
lines are displayed using the print(). As the end of file
is reached, the readline() will return an empty string.
Finally, the file is closed using the close().

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 Output of Program 2-4:
>>>
I am interested to learn about Computer SciencePython is easy to learn

Till now, we have been creating separate programs

for writing data to a file and for reading the file. Now
let us create one single program to read and write data
using a single file object. Since both the operations have
to be performed using a single file object, the file will be
opened in w+ mode.

Program 2-5 To perform reading and writing operation in a

text file

fileobject=open("report.txt", "w+")
print ("WRITING DATA IN THE FILE")
print() # to display a blank line
while True:
line= input("Enter a sentence ")
fileobject.write(line) fileobject.write('\
n')
choice=input("Do you wish to enter more data? (y/n): ")
if choice in ('n','N'): break
print("The byte position of file object is ",fileobject.tell())
fileobject.seek(0) #places file object at beginning of file
print()
print("READING DATA FROM THE FILE")
str=fileobject.read()
print(str)
fileobject.close()
In Program 2-5, the file will be read till the time end
of file is not reached and the output as shown in below
is displayed.
Output of Program 2-5:
>>>
RESTART: Path_to_file\Program2-5.py
WRITING DATA IN THE FILE

Enter a sentence I am a student of class XII

Do you wish to enter more data? (y/n): y
Enter a sentence my school contact number is 4390xxx8
Do you wish to enter more data? (y/n): n
The byte position of file object is 67

READING DATA FROM THE FILE

I am a student of class XII
my school contact number is 4390xxx8
>>>

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 NOTES 2.8 THE PICKLE MODULE
We know that Python considers everything as an
object. So, all data types including list, tuple,
dictionary, etc. are also considered as objects.
During execution of a program, we may require to
store current state of variables so that we can retrieve
them later to its present state. Suppose you are playing
a video game, and after some time, you want to close it.
So, the program should be able to store the current
state of the game, including current level/stage, your
score, etc. as a Python object. Likewise, you may like to
store a Python dictionary as an object, to be able to
retrieve later. To save any object structure along with
data, Python provides a module called Pickle. The
module Pickle is used for serializing and de-serializing
any Python object structure. Pickling is a method of
preserving food items by placing them in some
solution, which increases the shelf life. In other words,
it is a method to store food items for later
consumption.
Serialization is the process of transforming data or
an object in memory (RAM) to a stream of bytes called
byte streams. These byte streams in a binary file can
then be stored in a disk or in a database or sent through
a network. Serialization process is also called pickling.
De-serialization or unpickling is the inverse of
pickling process where a byte stream is converted back
to Python object.
The pickle module deals with binary files. Here, data
are not written but dumped and similarly, data are not
read but loaded. The Pickle Module must be imported
to load and dump data. The pickle module provides two
methods - dump() and load() to work with binary files
for pickling and unpickling, respectively.
2.8.1 The dump() method
This method is used to convert (pickling) Python objects
for writing data in a binary file. The file in which data
are to be dumped, needs to be opened in binary write
mode (wb).
Syntax of dump() is as follows:
dump(data_object, file_object)
where data_object is the object that has to be
dumped to the file with the file handle named file_
32 COMPUTER SCIENCE - CLASS XII
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object. For example, Program 2-6 writes the record
NOTES
of a student (roll_no, name, gender and marks) in the
binary file named mybinary.dat using the dump(). We
need to close the file after pickling.
Program 2-6 Pickling data in Python

import pickle
listvalues=[1,"Geetika",'F', 26]
fileobject=open("mybinary.dat", "wb")
pickle.dump(listvalues,fileobject)
fileobject.close()

2.8.2 The load() method

This method is used to load (unpickling) data from a
binary file. The file to be loaded is opened in binary read
(rb) mode. Syntax of load() is as follows:
Store_object = load(file_object)
Here, the pickled Python object is loaded from the
file having a file handle named file_object and is
stored in a new file handle called store_object. The
program 2-7 demonstrates how to read data from the
file mybinary.dat using the load().
Program 2-7 Unpickling data in Python

import pickle
print("The data that were stored in file are:
") fileobject=open("mybinary.dat","rb")
objectvar=pickle.load(fileobject)
fileobject.close()
print(objectvar)

Output of Program 2-7:

>>>
RESTART: Path_to_file\Program2-7.py
The data that were stored in file are:
[1, 'Geetika', 'F', 26]
>>>
2.8.3 File handling using pickle module
As we read and write data in a text file, similarly we
will be adding and displaying data for a binary file.
Program 2-8 accepts a record of an employee from the
user and appends it in the binary file tv. Thereafter, the
records are read from the binary file and displayed on
the screen using the same object. The user may enter

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 as many records as they wish to. The program also
displays the size of binary files before starting with the
reading process.

Program 2-8 To perform basic operations on a binary file using pickle module

# Program to write and read employee records in a binary file

import pickle
print("WORKING WITH BINARY FILES")
bfile=open("empfile.dat","ab")
recno=1
print ("Enter Records of Employees")
print()
#taking data from user and dumping in the file as list object
while True:
print("RECORD No.", recno)
eno=int(input("\tEmployee number : "))
ename=input("\tEmployee Name : ")
ebasic=int(input("\tBasic Salary : "))
allow=int(input("\tAllowances : "))
totsal=ebasic+allow
print("\tTOTAL SALARY : ", totsal)
edata=[eno,ename,ebasic,allow,totsal]
pickle.dump(edata,bfile)
ans=input("Do you wish to enter more records (y/n)? ")
recno=recno+1
if ans.lower()=='n':
print("Record entry OVER ")
print()
break
# retrieving the size of file
print("Size of binary file (in bytes):",bfile.tell())
bfile.close()
# Reading the employee records from the file using load() module
print("Now reading the employee records from the file")
print()
readrec=1
try:
with open("empfile.dat","rb") as bfile:
while True:
edata=pickle.load(bfile)
print("Record Number : ",readrec)
print(edata)
readrec=readrec+1
except EOFError:
pass
bfile.close()

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 NOTES
Output of Program 2-8:
>>>
RESTART: Path_to_file\Program2-8.py
WORKING WITH BINARY FILES
Enter Records of Employees

RECORD No. 1
Employee number : 11
Employee Name : D N Ravi
Basic Salary : 32600
Allowances : 4400
TOTAL SALARY : 37000
Do you wish to enter more records (y/n)? y
RECORD No. 2
Employee number : 12
Employee Name : Farida Ahmed
Basic Salary : 38250
Allowances : 5300
TOTAL SALARY : 43550
Do you wish to enter more records (y/n)? n
Record entry OVER

Size of binary file (in bytes): 216

Now reading the employee records from the file

Record Number : 1
[11, 'D N Ravi', 32600, 4400, 37000]
Record Number : 2
[12, 'Farida Ahmed', 38250, 5300, 43550]
>>>
As each employee record is stored as a list in the
file empfile.dat, hence while reading the file, a list is
displayed showing record of each employee. Notice that
in Program 2-8, we have also used try.. except block to
handle the end-of-file exception.

SUMMARY
• A file is a named location on a secondary storage
media where data are permanently stored for
later access.
• A text file contains only textual information
consisting of alphabets, numbers and other

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 NOTES
special symbols. Such files are stored with
extensions like .txt, .py, .c, .csv, .html, etc. Each
byte of a text file represents a character.
• Each line of a text file is stored as a sequence
of ASCII equivalent of the characters and is
terminated by a special character, called the End
of Line (EOL).
• Binary file consists of data stored as a stream
of bytes.
• open() method is used to open a file in Python and
it returns a file object called file handle. The file
handle is used to transfer data to and from the file
by calling the functions defined in the Python’s
io module.
• close() method is used to close the file. While
closing a file, the system frees up all the resources
like processor and memory allocated to it.
• write() method takes a string as an argument
and writes it to the text file.
• writelines() method is used to write multiple
strings to a file. We need to pass an iterable
object like lists, tuple etc. containing strings to
writelines() method.
• read([n]) method is used to read a specified
number of bytes (n) of data from a data file.
• readline([n]) method reads one complete
line from a file where lines are ending with a
newline (\n). It can also be used to read a specified
number
(n) of bytes of data from a file but maximum up
to the newline character (\n).
• readlines() method reads all the lines and
returns the lines along with newline character,
as a list of strings.
• tell() method returns an integer that specifies
the current position of the file object. The position
so specified is the byte position from the beginning
of the file till the current position of the file object.
• seek()method is used to position the file object
at a particular position in a file.

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 • Pickling is the process by which a Python object NOTES
is converted to a byte stream.
• dump() method is used to write the objects in
a binary file.
• load() method is used to read data from a
binary file.

EXERCISE
1. Differentiate between:
a) text file and binary file
b) readline() and readlines()
c) write() and writelines()

2. Write the use and syntax for the following methods:

a) open()
b) read()
c) seek()
d) dump()

3. Write the file mode that will be used for opening the
following files. Also, write the Python statements to open
the following files:
a) a text file “example.txt” in both read and write mode
b) a binary file “bfile.dat” in write mode
c) a text file “try.txt” in append and read mode
d) a binary file “btry.dat” in read only mode.

4. Why is it advised to close a file after we are done with

the read and write operations? What will happen if we do
not close it? Will some error message be flashed?

5. What is the difference between the following set of

statements (a) and (b):
a) P = open(“practice.txt”,”r”)
P.read(10)
b) with open(“practice.txt”, “r”) as P:
x = P.read()

6. Write a command(s) to write the following lines to the

text file named hello.txt. Assume that the file is opened
in append mode.
“ Welcome my class”
“It is a fun place”
“You will learn and play”

FILE HANDLING IN PYTHON 37

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 NOTES 7. Write a Python program to open the file hello.txt used in
question no 6 in read mode to display its contents. What
will be the difference if the file was opened in write mode
instead of append mode?

8. Write a program to accept string/sentences from the

user till the user enters “END” to. Save the data in a text
file and then display only those sentences which begin
with an uppercase alphabet.

9. Define pickling in Python. Explain serialization and

deserialization of Python object.

10. Write a program to enter the following records in a binary

file:
Item No integer
Item_Name string
Qty integer
Price float
Number of records to be entered should be accepted
from the user. Read the file to display the records in the
following format:
Item No:
Item Name :
Quantity:
Price per item:
Amount: ( to be calculated as Price * Qty)

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 h a pter
C
3 Stac
k
“We're going to be able to ask our
computers to monitor things for us, and when
certain conditions happen, are triggered, the
computers will take certain actions and inform
us after the fact.”
— Steve Jobs

In this Chapter
» Introduction
» Stack
» Operations on Stack 3.1 INTRODUCTION
» Implementation of Stack We have learnt about different data types in
in Python Python for handling values in Class XI. Recall
» Notations for Arithmetic that String, List, Set, Tuple, etc. are the sequence
Expressions data types that can be used to represent
» Conversion From Infix To collection of elements either of the same type or
Postfix Notation different types. Multiple data elements are
» Evaluation of Postfix grouped in a particular way for faster
Expression accessibility and efficient storage of data. That is
why we have used different data types in python
for storing data values. Such grouping is referred
as a data structure.
A data structure defines a mechanism to
store, organise and access data along with
operations (processing) that can be efficiently
performed on the data. For example, string is a
data structure containing a sequence of elements
where each element is a character. On the other
hand, list is a sequence data structure in which
each element may be of different types. We can
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apply different
operations like
reversal, slicing,
counting of

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 elements, etc. on list and string. Hence, a data structure
organises multiple elements in a way so that certain
operations on each element as well as the collective
data unit could be performed easily.
Other important
data structures Stack and Queue are two other popular data
in Computer structures used in programming. Although not directly
Science include available in Python, it is important to learn these
Array, Linked concepts as they are extensively used in a number of
List, Binary Trees, programming languages. In this chapter, we will study
Heaps, Graph,
Sparse Matrix, about stack, its implementation using Python as well as
etc. its applications.

3.2 STACK
We have seen piles of books in the library or stack of
plates at home (Figure 3.1). To put another book or
another plate in such a pile, we always place (add to
the pile) the object at the top only. Likewise, to remove
a book or a plate from such a pile, we always remove
(delete from the pile) the object from the top only. This
is because in a large pile, it is inconvenient to add or
remove an object from in between or bottom. Such an
arrangement of elements in a linear order is called a
A data structure stack. We add new elements or remove existing elements
in which elements
are organised from the same end, commonly referred to as the top of
in a sequence is the stack. It thus follows the Last-In-First-out (LIFO)
called linear data principle. That is, the element which was inserted last
structure. (the most recent element) will be the first one to be taken
out from the stack.

Figure 3.1: Stack of plates and books

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3.2.1 APPLICATIONS OF STACK
How does a compiler
Some of the applications of stack in real-life are:
or an interpreter
• Pile of clothes in an almirah handle function calls
in a program?
• Multiple chairs in a vertical pile
• Bangles worn on wrist
• Pile of boxes of eatables in pantry or on a kitchen
shelf
Some examples of application of stack in programming
are as follows:
• When we need to reverse a string, the string is
traversed from the last character till the first
character. i.e. characters are traversed in the
reverse order of their appearance in the string. This
is very easily done by putting the characters of a
string in a stack.
• We use text/image editor for editing the text/image
where we have options to redo/undo the editing
done. When we click on the redo /undo icon, the
most recent editing is redone/undone. In this
scenario, the system uses a stack to keep track of
changes made.
• While browsing the web, we move from one web page
to another by accessing links between them. In
The operating
order to go back to the last visited web page, we may system in computer
use the back button on the browser. Let us say we or mobile allocates
accessed a web page P1 from where we moved to memory to different
web page P2 followed by browsing of web page P3. applications for
Currently, we are on web page P3 and want to their execution. How
does an operating
revisit web page P1. We may go to a previously
system keep track
visited web page by using the BACK button of the of the free memory
browser. On clicking the BACK button once, we are that can be allocated
taken from web page P3 to web page P2, another among programs/
click on BACK shows web page P1. In this case, the applications to be
executed?
history of browsed pages is maintained as stack.
• While writing any arithmetic expression in a program,
we may use parentheses to order the evaluation
of operators. While executing the program, the
compiler checks for matched parentheses i.e. each
opening parenthesis should have a corresponding
closing parenthesis and the pairs of parentheses
are properly nested. In case of parentheses are

STACK 41
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 mismatched, the compiler needs to throw an error. To
handle matching of parentheses, stack is used.

3.3 OPERATIONS ON STACK

As explained in the previous section, a stack is a mechanism
that implements LIFO arrangement hence elements are
added and deleted from the stack at one end only. The
end from which elements are added or deleted is called
TOP of the stack. Two fundamental operations
performed on the stack are PUSH and POP. In this
section, we will learn about them and implement them
using Python.

3.3.1 PUSH and POP Operations

• PUSH adds a new element at the TOP of the stack.
It is an insertion operation. We can add elements
to a stack until it is full. A stack is full when no
more elements can be added to it. Trying to add an
element to a full stack results in an exception called
‘overflow’.
• POP operation is used to remove the top most
element of the stack, that is, the element at the TOP of
the stack. It is a delete operation. We can delete
elements from a stack until it is empty i.e. there is no
element in it. Trying to delete an element from an
empty stack results in an exception called ‘underflow’.
A stack is used
to insert and delete
elements in LIFO
Top 2 Top 3
Top
order. Same principle
1 1 Top 1 1
is followed in adding
(i) Empty (ii) Push 1 (iii) Push 2 (iv) Pop (v) Push 3 and removing glasses
Stack (2 will be from a pile of glasses.
removed)
Let us create a stack of
glasses assuming that
Top 4 each glass is numbered.
3 Top 3 Visual representations
1 1 Top 1 of PUSH and POP
(vi) Push 4 (vii) Pop (viii) Pop (ix) Pop (x) Empty
operations on a stack
(4 will be (3 will be (1 will be Stack of glasses are shown in
removed) removed) removed) Figure 3.2.
Figure 3.2: PUSH and POP operations on the stack of glasses

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3.4 IMPLEMENTATION OF STACK IN PYTHON NOTES
We have learnt so far that a stack is a linear and ordered
collection of elements. The simple way to implement a
stack in Python is using the data type list. We can fix
either of the sides of the list as TOP to insert/remove
elements. It is to be noted that we are using built-in
methods append() and pop() of the list for implementation
of the stack. As these built-in methods insert/delete
elements at the rightmost end of the list, hence explicit
declaration of TOP is not needed.
Let us write a program to create a STACK (stack of
glasses as given in Figure 3.2) in which we will:
• insert/delete elements (glasses)
• check if the STACK is empty (no glasses in the
stack)
• find the number of elements (glasses) in the STACK
• read the value of the topmost element (number on
the topmost glass) in the STACK
The program shall define the following functions to
perform these operations:
• Let us create an empty stack named glassStack.
We will do so by assigning an empty list to the
identifier named glassStack:
glassStack = list()

• A function named isEmpty to check whether the

stack glassStack is empty or not. Remember trying
to remove an element from an empty stack would
result in ‘underflow’. This function returns True if
the stack is empty, else returns False.
def isEmpty(glassStack):
if len(glassStack)==0:
return True
else:
return False
• A function named opPush to insert (PUSH) a new
element in stack. This function has two parameters
- the name of the stack in which the element is to be
inserted (glassStack) and the element that needs
to be inserted. We know that insertion of an element
is always done at the TOP of the stack. Hence, we

STACK 43
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 NOTES shall use the built-in method append() of list to
add an element to the stack that always adds at the
end of the list. As there is no limit on the size of list
in Python, the implemented stack will never be full
unless there is no more space available in memory.
Hence, we will never face ‘overflow’ (no space for
new element) condition for stack.
def opPush(glassStack,element):
glassStack.append(element)
• A function named size to read the number of
elements in the glassStack. We will use the len()
function of list in Python to find the number of
elements in the glassStack.
def size(glassStack):
return len(glassStack)
• A function named top to read the most recent element
(TOP) in the glassStack.
def top(glassStack):
if isEmpty(glassStack):
print('Stack is empty')
return None
else:
x =len(glassStack)
element=glassStack[x-1]
return element
• A function named opPop to delete the topmost
element from the stack. It takes one parameter - the
name of the stack (glassStack) from which element
is to be deleted and returns the value of the deleted
element. The function first checks whether the stack
is empty or not. If it is not empty, it removes the
topmost element from it. We shall use the built-
in method pop() of Python list that removes the
element from the end of the list.
def opPop(glassStack):
if isEmpty(glassStack):
print('underflow')
return None
else:
return(glassStack.pop())

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• A function named display to show the contents of
NOTES
the stack.
def display(glassStack):
x=len(glassStack)
print("Current elements in the stack
are: ")
for i in range(x-1,-1,-1):
print(glassStack[i])
Once we define the above functions we can use
the following Python code to implement a stack of
glasses.
glassStack = list() # create empty stack

#add elements to stack

element='glass1'
print("Pushing element ",element)
opPush(glassStack,element)
element='glass2'
print("Pushing element ",element)
opPush(glassStack,element)

#display number of elements in stack

print("Current number of elements in stack
is",size(glassStack))

#delete an element from the stack

element=opPop(glassStack)
print("Popped element is",element)

#add new element to stack

element='glass3'
print("Pushing element ",element)
opPush(glassStack,element)

#display the last element added to the

#stack
print("top element is",top(glassStack))

#display all elements in the stack

display(glassStack)

STACK 45
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 NOTES #delete all elements from stack
while True:
item=opPop(glassStack)
if item == None:
print("Stack is empty now")
break
else:
print("Popped element is",item)

The output of the above program will be as

follows:
Pushing element glass1
Pushing element glass2
Current number of elements in stack is 2
Popped element is glass2
Pushing element glass3
top element is glass3
Current elements in the stack are:
glass3
glass1
Popped element is glass3
Popped element is glass1
Underflow
Stack is empty now

3.5 NOTATIONS FOR ARITHMETIC EXPRESSIONS

We write arithmetic expressions using operators in
between operands, like x + y, 2 - 3 * y, etc. and use
parentheses () to order the evaluation of operators in
complex expressions. These expressions follow infix
representation and are evaluated using BODMAS rule.
Polish mathematician Jan Lukasiewicz in the
1920's introduced a different way of representing
arithmetic expression, called polish notation. In such
notation, operators are written before their operands.
So the order of operations and operands determines the
result, making parentheses unnecessary. For example,
we can write x+y in polish notation as +xy. This is
also called prefix notation as we prefix the operator
before operands.
By reversing this logic, we can write an expression
by putting operators after their operands. For example,
x+y can be written as xy+. This is called reverse polish

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notation or postfix notation. To summarise, any
arithmetic expression can be represented in any of the
three notations viz. Infix, Prefix and Postfix and are
listed in Table 3.1 with examples.
Table 3.1 Infix, Prefix and Postfix Notations
Type of
Description Example
Expression
Infix Operators are placed in x*y+z
between the operands 3 *(4 + 5)
(x + y)/(z * 5)
Prefix Operators are placed +z*xy
(Polish) before the corresponding *3+45
operands /+xy*z5
Postfix Operators are placed xy*z+
(Reverse Polish) after the corresponding 345+*
operands xy+z5*/

3.6 CONVERSION FROM INFIX TO POSTFIX NOTATION

It is easy for humans to evaluate an infix expression.
Consider an infix expression x + y / z. While going
from left to right we first encounter + operator, but we
do not add x + y and rather evaluate y/z, followed by
addition operation. This is because we know the order
of precedence of operators that follows BODMAS rule.
But, how do we pass this precedence knowledge to the
computer through an expression?
In contrast, prefix/postfix expressions do not have
to deal with such precedence because the operators
are already positioned according to their order of
evaluation. Hence a single traversal from left to right is
sufficient to evaluate the expression. In this section, we
will learn about the conversion of an arithmetic
Write an algorithm
expression written in infix notation to its equivalent to convert an infix
expression in postfix notation using a stack. expression into
equivalent prefix
During such conversion, a stack is used to keep track
expression using
of the operators encountered in the infix expression. A stack.
variable of string type is used to store the equivalent
postfix expression. Algorithm 3.1 converts an expression
in infix notation to postfix notation:

Algorithm 3.1: Conversion of expression from infix to postfix notation

Step 1: Create an empty string named postExp to store the converted postfix expression.
Step 2: INPUT infix expression in a variable, say inExp
Step 3: For each character in inExp, REPEAT Step 4

STACK 47
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Step 4: IF character is a left parenthesis THEN PUSH on the Stack
ELSE IF character is a right parenthesis
THEN POP the elements from the Stack and append to string
postExp until the corresponding left parenthesis is popped
while discarding both left and right parentheses
ELSE IF character is an operator
THEN IF its precedence is lower than that of operator at the top of Stack
THEN POP elements from the Stack till an
operator with precedence less than the current
operator is encountered and append to string
postExp before pushing this operator on the
postStack
ELSE PUSH operator on the Stack
ELSE Append the character to postExp
Step 5: Pop elements from the Stack and append to postExp until Stack is empty
Step 6: OUTPUT postExp

Example 3.1
Let us now use this algorithm to convert a given infix
expression (x + y)/(z*8) into equivalent postfix
expression using a stack. Figure 3.3 shows the steps to
be followed on encountering an operator or an
operand in the given infix expression. Note here that
stack is used to track the operators and parentheses,
and a string variable contains the equivalent postfix
expression. Initially both are empty. Each character in
the given infix expression is processed from left to
right and the appropriate action is taken as detailed in
the algorithm. When each character in the given infix
expression has been processed, the string will contain
the equivalent postfix expression.

SYMBOL : ( x + y

ACTION : PUSH Append PUSH Append

to string to string
postExp postExp

Initial
Stack
+ +
(Empty)
( ( ( (
POSTFIX
empty x x xy
STRING (postExp)

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 Figure 3.3: Conversion of infix expression (x + y)/(z*8) to postfix notation

3.7 EVALUATION OF POSTFIX EXPRESSION

Stacks can be used to evaluate an expression in postfix
notation. For simplification, we are assuming that
operators used in expressions are binary operators.
The detailed step by step procedure is given in
Algorithm 3.2.

Algorithm 3.2: Evaluation of postfix expression

Step 1: INPUT postfix expression in a variable, say postExp
Step 2: For each character in postExp, REPEAT Step 3
Step 3: IF character is an operand
THEN PUSH character on the Stack
ELSE POP two elements from the Stack, apply the operator on

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 the popped elements and PUSH the computed value onto
the Stack
Step 4: IF Stack has a single element
THEN POP the element and OUTPUT as the net result
ELSE OUTPUT “Invaild Postfix expression”

Example 3.2
Figure 3.4 shows the step-by-step process of evaluation
of the postfix expression 7 8 2 * 4 / + using Algorithm
3.2 .

SYMBOL : 7 8 2
ACTION : PUSH PUSH PUSH

Initial
Stack 2
(Empty) 8 8
7 7 7

SYMBOL : * 4 /

ACTION : POP two PUSH POP two

Write an algorithm to elements, apply elements, apply
evaluate any prefix the operator the operator and
expression using a and push back push back the
stack. the result result

4
16 16 4
7 7 7

SYMBOL : + End of
Input
Expression

ACTION : POP two POP

elements, apply
the operator
and push back
the result

Final
Stack Result = 11
(Empty)
11
EMPTY

Figure 3.4: Evaluation of postfix expression 7 8 2 * 4 /+

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 SUMMARY NOTES
• Stack is a data structure in which insertion
and deletion is done from one end only, usually
referred to as TOP.
• Stack follows LIFO principle using which an
element inserted in the last will be the first one
to be out.
• PUSH and POP are two basic operations
performed on a stack for insertion and deletion of
elements, respectively.
• Trying to pop an element from an empty stack
results into a special condition underflow.
• In Python, list is used for implementing a stack
and its built-in-functions append and pop are
used for insertion and deletion, respectively.
Hence, no explicit declaration of TOP is needed.
• Any arithmetic expression can be represented
in any of the three notations viz. Infix, Prefix
and Postfix.
• While programming, Infix notation is used for
writing an expression in which binary operators
are written in between the operands.
• A single traversal from left to right of Prefix/
Postfix expression is sufficient to evaluate the
expression as operators are correctly placed as
per their order of precedence.
• Stack is commonly used data structure to convert
an Infix expression into equivalent Prefix/Postfix
notation.
• While conversion of an Infix notation to its
equivalent Prefix/Postfix notation, only operators
are PUSHed onto the Stack.
• When evaluating any Postfix expression using
Stack, only operands are PUSHed onto it.

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 NOTES
EXERCISE
1. State TRUE or FALSE for the following cases:
a) Stack is a linear data structure
b) Stack does not follow LIFO rule
c) PUSH operation may result into underflow condition
d) In POSTFIX notation for expression, operators are
placed after operands
2. Find the output of the following code:
a) result=0
numberList=[10,20,30]
numberList.append(40)
result=result+numberList.pop()
result=result+numberList.pop()
print(“Result=”,result)
b) answer=[]; output=''
answer.append('T')
answer.append('A')
answer.append('M')
ch=answer.pop()
output=output+ch
ch=answer.pop()
output=output+ch
ch=answer.pop()
output=output+ch
print(“Result=”,output)
3. Write a program to reverse a string using stack.
4. For the following arithmetic expression:
((2+3)*(4/2))+2
Show step-by-step process for matching parentheses
using stack data structure.
5. Evaluate following postfix expressions while showing
status of stack after each operation given A=3, B=5,
C=1, D=4
a) A B + C *
b) A B * C / D *
6. Convert the following infix notations to postfix notations,
showing stack and string contents at each step.
a) A + B - C * D
b) A * (( C + D)/E)
7. Write a program to create a Stack for storing only odd
numbers out of all the numbers entered by the user.
Display the content of the Stack along with the largest
odd number in the Stack. (Hint. Keep popping out the
elements from stack and maintain the largest element
retrieved so far in a variable. Repeat till Stack is empty)

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 “We could say we want the Web to refiect
a vision of the world where everything is done
democratically. To do that, we get computers
to talk with each other in such a way as to
promote that ideal.”
— Tim Berners-Lee

In this Chapter
» Introduction to Queue
» Operations on Queue
» Implementation of Queue
4.1 INTRODUCTION TO QUEUE
using Python
» Introduction to Deque In the previous chapter we learned about a data
structure called Stack, which works on Last-In-
» Implementation of Deque
First-Out (LIFO) principle. In this chapter, we
using Python
will learn about another data structure called
Queue which works on First-In-First-Out (FIFO)
principle. Queue is an ordered linear list of
elements, having
different ends for adding
and removing elements
Cashier Next in it.
Examples of queue
in our everyday life
include students
standing in a queue
for morning assembly,
customers forming a
queue at the cash
counter in a bank
(Figure 4.1), vehicles
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 q ueued at fuel pumps
Figure 4.1: Queue of people at a bank (Figure 4.2), etc.

h a pter
C
4 Queu
e

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 NOTES

Figure 4.2: Queue of cars in a petrol pump

4.1.1 First In First Out (FIFO)

Queue follows the principle of First In First Out (FIFO),
since the element entering first in the queue will be the
first one to come out of it. Thus, the element that has
been longest in the queue will be removed first. It is
also known as a First Come First Served (FCFS)
approach. Queue is an arrangement in which new
objects/items always get added at one end, usually
called the REAR, and objects/items always get
removed from the other end, usually called the FRONT
of the queue. REAR is also known as TAIL and FRONT
as HEAD of a queue.

4.1.2 Applications of Queue

(A) The concept of queue has many applications in

real-life:
• If a train ticket is in the waiting list (such as W/L1),
it means the ticket is in a queue of tickets waiting to
get confirmed, as per the increasing order of waiting
numbers. If a confirmed ticket is cancelled, the W/
L1 numbered ticket is removed from the FRONT of
the waiting queue and confirmed.
• Sometimes on calling a customer service centre, the
Interactive Voice Response System (IVRS) tells us
to wait till a support person is available. Here the
call is put into a queue of customers waiting to be
serviced.
• Imagine there is a single-lane one-way road, then the
vehicle that entered first will exit first, following the
concept of queue. Likewise, vehicles in a highway toll
tax booth are served following the principle of FIFO.
54 COMPUTER SCIENCE - CLASS XII
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 (B) Following are some examples of application of
queue in computer science:
• Suppose there is a web-server hosting a web-site to
declare result(s). This server can handle a maximum
of 50 concurrent requests to view result(s). So, to
serve thousands of user requests, a Queue would be
the most appropriate data structure to use.
• Some Operating Systems (OS) are required to
handle multiple tasks called - jobs, seeking to use
the processor. But we know that a processor can
handle only one task at a time. Therefore, in a In the web-server
example (for result
multitasking operating system, jobs are lined up
declaration), suppose
(queued) and then given access to the processor the server receives
according to some order. The simplest way is to give a request from an
access to the processor on a FIFO basis, that is Administrator to
according to the order in which the jobs arrive with access the result of a
school on an urgent
a request for the processor. basis, along with
• When we send print commands from multiple files other requests from
students to check
from the same computer or from different computers individual results.
using a shared printer. The OS puts these print Can you suggest some
requests in a queue and sends them to the printer strategy to ensure
one by one on a FIFO basis. service to all as per
their urgency?

4.2 OPERATIONS ON QUEUE

Following the FIFO approach, data structure queue supports
the following operations:
• ENQUEUE: is used to insert a new element to the
queue at the rear end. We can insert elements in
the queue till there is space in the queue for adding
more elements. Inserting elements beyond capacity
of the queue will result in an exception - known as
Overflow.
• DEQUEUE: is used to remove one element at a time
from the front of the queue. We can delete elements
from a queue until it is empty, trying to delete an
element from an empty queue will result in exception
- known as Underflow.
To perform enqueue and dequeue efficiently on a
queue, following operations are also required:
• IS EMPTY : used to check whether the queue has
any element or not, so as to avoid Underflow
exception while performing dequeue operation.

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 • PEEK : used to view elements at the front of the
queue, without removing it from the queue.
While using a
list to implement • IS FULL : used to check whether any more
queue, we can elements can be added to the queue or not, to avoid
designate either Overflow exceptions while performing enqueue
end of the list
operation.
as Front or Rear
of the queue. Figure 4.3 shows the various stages of a simple
But we have to
queue containing alphabets. In the figure, Front of the
fix either of the
ends index[0] queue is on the left and Rear on the right.
or index[n-1] as
Front and fix the Operation performed Status of queue after operation
opposite end as enqueue(z) F Z R
Rear. enqueue(x) F Z X R

enqueue(c) F Z X C R

dequeue() F X C R

enqueue(v) F X C V R

dequeue() F C V R

dequeue() F V R

Figure 4.3: Various Stages of Stack Operations

4.3 IMPLEMENTATION OF QUEUE USING PYTHON

There are many ways in which queues can be implemented in a
computer program, one way is using the list data type of
Python. For creating a queue structure in the program,
following functions need to be defined:
• Let’s create a queue named myQueue. We can
create it by assigning an empty list.
myQueue = list()
• A function (enqueue) to insert a new element at
the end of queue. The function has two parameters
- name of the queue and element which is to be
inserted in the queue.
def enqueue(myQueue, element):
myQueue.append(element)
Note: append() function always adds an element at the end of the
list, hence Rear of queue.
• We don’t need to implement Is Full, as Python
being a dynamic language, does not ask for the

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creation of list having fixed size. Hence, we will never
encounter a situation when the queue is full.
• A function (isEmpty) to check, if the queue has an
element or not? This can be done by checking the
length of the queue. The function has a parameter
-- name of the queue and returns True if the queue
is empty False otherwise.
def isEmpty(myQueue):
if len(myQueue)==0:
return True Can you implement a
else: queue data structure
using tuple or
return False dictionary?
• A function (dequeue) to delete an element from the
front of the queue. It has one parameter - name
of the queue and returns the deleted element. The
function first checks if the queue is empty or not, for
successful deletion.
def dequeue(myQueue):
if not (isEmpty(myQueue)):
return myQueue.pop(0)
else :
print(“Queue is empty”)
Note: The pop() function with index[0] will delete the element from
the beginning of the list, hence Front of queue.
• A function (size) to get the number of elements in
the queue. We can use the len() function of Python’s
list to find the number of elements in the queue. The
function has one parameter - name of the queue and
returns the number of elements in the queue.
def size(myQueue):
return len(myQueue)
• A function (peek) to simply read, but not to delete,
the element at the front end of the queue. For this,
we can read the element at index[0] of the queue.
While choosing
The function has one parameter - name of the queue the name of above
and returns the value of element at Front if queue is functions general
not empty, None otherwise. naming convention
def peek(myQueue): w.r.t. the queue is
followed. As these
if isEmpty(myQueue): are user defined
print('Queue is empty') functions any
return None other name can
also be used.
else:
return myQueue[0]

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 Activity 4.1 Let us consider the example of a queue that people
How can you avoid form while waiting at a bank cash counter. Usually,
printing of None, following are the events that occur in queue:
when trying to • Two friends come together and go to the cash
print an empty
queue? counter, i.e. they form a queue - enqueue operation
is performed two times.
• As soon as the person at the front is serviced, he will
be removed from the queue - thus dequeue operation
is performed. Cashier calls Next to serve the next
Activity 4.2
person who is now at the front of the queue.
What if the content of
the complete queue • Cashier wants to know the length of the queue - size
is to be listed? of the queue is checked.
Write a function
for it. • Meanwhile, a few more people walk in the bank,
and three of them join the queue at the cash
counter, i.e. enqueue happens 3 times.
• Another person gets served and leaves the counter,
i.e. dequeue is performed. Cashier calls Next to serve
another person.
• The Next three people get served one after another,
i.e. dequeue is performed thrice.
• Cashier calls Next and realises that there are no more
people to be served - underflow situation happens
Now, let us write the code for the above scenario of
the bank.

Program 4-1
myQueue = list()
# each person to be assigned a code as P1, P2, P3,...
element = input("enter person’s code to enter in queue :”)
enqueue(myQueue,element)
element = input("enter person’s code for insertion in queue :")
enqueue(myQueue,element)
print("person removed from queue is:", dequeue(myQueue))
print(“Number of people in the queue is :”,size(myQueue))
element = input("enter person’s code to enter in queue :")
enqueue(myQueue,element)
element = input("enter person’s code to enter in queue :")
enqueue(myQueue,element)
element = input("enter person’s code to enter in queue :")
enqueue(myQueue,element)

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 print("Now we are going to remove remaining people from the
queue")
while not isEmpty(myQueue):
print("person removed from queue is ",
dequeue(myQueue))
Output
enter person’s code to enter in queue :P1
enter person’s code to enter in queue :P2
person removed from the queue is :p1
number of people in the queue is :1
enter person’s code to enter in queue :P3
enter person’s code to enter in queue :P4
enter person’s code to enter in queue :P5
Now we are going to remove remaining people from the queue
person removed from the queue is :p2
person removed from the queue is :p3
person removed from the queue is :p4
person removed from the queue is :p5
Queue is empty

4.4 INTRODUCTION TO DEQUE

Deque (pronounced as “deck”) is an arrangement in
which addition and removal of element(s) can happen
from any end, i.e. head/front or tail/rear. This data
structure does not apply any restriction on the side from
which addition/removal of elements should happen,
so it can be used to implement stack or queue in the
program. It is also known as Double ended queue,
because it permits insertion, deletion operations from
any end.

(insertion) Push
Push (insertion)
(deletion) Pop
Pop (deletion)

Front Rear

Figure 4.4: Basic deque structure displaying head and tail to implement stack or queue.

4.4.1 Applications of Deque

• At a train ticket purchasing counter, a normal
queue of people is formed for purchasing a ticket. A
person at the front purchased the ticket and left the
counter. After a while they return back to the
counter to ask
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 something. As they have already purchased a ticket,
they may have the privilege to join the queue from
the front.
• Vehicles in a highway toll tax booth are served
following the principle of queue. There are multiple
queues if there are parallel booths at the toll gate. In
case all vehicles of a booth are served then vehicles
from the other booth(s) are asked to form a queue in
front of the vacant booth. So, vehicles at the end of
those queues will leave (removed from the end from
where queue was joined) current booth and join
Activity 4.3 queue at the vacant booth.
In a deque, if insertion Following are some examples where data structure
and deletion of
deque maybe applied in computer science:
elements is done from
the same end, it will • To maintain browser history (URL), usually a stack
behave as is used, because once a tab is closed and if you
1) Queue press ctrl+shift+T, the most recently closed URL is
2) Stack
3) List
opened first. As the number of URLs which can be
4) None of the stored in history is fixed, so when this list of URLs
above becomes large, URLs from the end of the list (i.e.
which were least visited) gets deleted.
• Same happens for providing the Do and Undo option
in any text editor.
• To check whether a given string is palindrome or not?
Activity 4.4 Process string left to right (character wise) and insert
In a deque, if insertion
it in deque from tail/rear like a normal queue. Once
and deletion of the entire string is processed (i.e. inserted in
elements is done from deque) we will take out (delete) a character from
the opposite end, it will both the ends and match them till there is no
behave as character left or only one character left in deque. In
1) Queue
either case, string is palindrome.
2) Stack
3) List
4) None of the 4.4.2 Operations on Deque
above • INSERTFRONT: This operation is used to insert a
new element at the front of the deque.
• INSERTREAR: This operation is the same as a
normal queue, i.e. insert a new element at the rear
of the deque.
• DELETIONFRONT: This operation is the same as
normal queue, i.e. to remove an element from the
front of the deque.
• DELETIONREAR: This operation is used to remove
one element at a time from the rear of the deque.

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 To perform above operations efficiently on a deque,
NOTES
we will need all supporting operations used in normal
queue viz Is Empty, Peek, Size.
Let’s understand how these operations work for
checking whether a string is palindrome or not, using a
deque through the following algorithm.
Algorithm 4.1

Step1: Start traversing string (madam) from left side, a

character at a time.
Step 2: Insert the character in deque as normal queue
using
INSERTREAR.
Step 3: Repeat Step 1 and Step 2 for all characters of
string (madam)

m a d a insertrear
(m)

Front Rear
Figure 4.5: Status of Deque after 4th iteration

Step 4: Remove one character from the front and one

character from the rear end of deque using
DELETIONFRONT and DELETIONREAR we can
do it.

removefront a d a insertrear
(m)
(m)

Front Rear
Figure 4.6: Status of Deque after removing one character from both
the ends.

Step 5: Match these two removed characters.

Step 6: If they are same then
repeat Step 4 and 5 till deque is empty or left
with only one character,
eventually string is Palindrome
else stop as string is not palindrome

4.5 IMPLEMENTATION OF DEQUE USING PYTHON

Like queue, deque is also an ordered linear list, hence
we use list data type to create deque in our program.
The program should have the following functions/
statement(s) defined in it:

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 NOTES • A statement to create deque, with name myDeque.
myDeque = list()

• A function insertFront(), to insert an element at the

front of deque having two parameters - name of
deque and element to be inserted. As the element is
to be inserted in the beginning, we will use insert()
with index 0 for it.
def insertFront(myDeque, element):
myDeque.insert(0,element)

• A function insertRear(), to insert an element at the

rear of deque. It’s implementation will be the same as
enqueue() of normal queue requiring two parameters
same as insertFront().
• A function isEmpty(), to check the presence of
element(s) in deque will be the same as the function,
with the same name, defined for normal queue.
• A function deletionRear(), to delete an element from
the rear of the deque. It only requires the name of
deque and returns the deleted element. We will use
pop() without parameter(s) to delete the last element
of the deque.
def deletionRear(myDeque):
if not (isEmpty()):
return myDeque.pop()
# removing data from end of list
else :
print(“Deque empty”)

• A function deletionFront(), to delete an element from

the front of deque. It’s implementation will be the
same as dequeue() of normal queue.
• A function getFront(), to read value from the front of
deque, without removing it from the queue when the
queue is not empty. It accepts the name of deque as
parameter and returns a copy of value.
def getFront(mydeque):
if not (isEmpty()):
return mydeque[0]
else :
print(“ Queue empty”)
• A function getRear(), to read value from the rear of
the deque, without removing it from the deque. The

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 function accepts deque as argument and returns a
NOTES
copy of value, when the queue is not empty.
def getRear(mydeque):
if not (isempty()):
return mydeque[len(mydeque)-1]
else :
print(“ Deque empty”)
Let us write a main(), function to invoke various
Deque functions :

Program 4-2 Implementation of Deque in Python

def insertFront(myDeque,element):
myDeque.insert(0,element)

def getFront(myDeque):
if not (isEmpty(myDeque)):
return myDeque[0]
else:
print("Queue underflow")

def getRear(myDeque):
if not (isEmpty(myDeque)):
return myDeque[len(myDeque)-1]
else:
print ("Queue underflow")

def insertRear(myDeque,element):
myDeque.append(element)

def isEmpty(myDeque):
if len(myDeque) == 0:
return True
else:
return False

def deletionRear(myDeque):
if not isEmpty(myDeque):
return myDeque.pop()
else:
print("Queue underflow")

def deletionFront(myDeque):
if isEmpty(myDeque):

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 print("Queue underflow")
else:
return myDeque.pop(0)

def main():
dQu = list()
choice = int(input('enter 1 to use as normal queue 2 otherwise
: '))
if choice == 1:
element = input("data for insertion at rear ")
insertRear(dQu,element)
element = getFront(dQu)
print("data at the beginning of queue is ", element)
element = input("data for insertion at front ")
insertRear(dQu,element)
print('data removed from front of queue is ', deletionFront(dQu))
print('data removed from front of queue is ', deletionFront(dQu))

Output
enter 1 to use as normal queue 2 otherwise : 1
data for insertion at rear 23
data at the beginning of queue is 23
data for insertion at rear 45
data removed from front of queue is 23
data removed from front of queue is 45
Queue underflow
data removed from front of queue is None

enter 1 to use as normal queue 2 otherwise : 2

data for insertion at front 34
data at the end of queue is 34
data for insertion at front 56
data removed from rear of queue is 34
data removed from rear of queue is 56
Queue underflow
data removed from rear of queue is None

SUMMARY
• Queue is an ordered linear data structure,
following FIFO strategy.
• Front and Rear are used to indicate beginning
and end of queue.
• In Python, the use of predefined methods takes
care of Front and Rear.

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 • Insertion in a queue happens at the rear end. NOTES
Deletion happens at the front.
• Insertion operation is known as enqueue and
deletion operation is known as dequeue.
• To support enqueue and dequeue operations,
isEmpty, isfull and peek operations are used
• Deque is a version of queue, which allows insertion
and deletion at both ends.
• A deque can support both stack and queue
operations.
• Other operations supported by deque are
insertfront, insertrear, deletefront, deleterear,
getfront, getrear, isempty and isfull.

EXERCISE
1.
Fill in the blank
a) is a linear list of elements
in which insertion and deletion takes place from
different ends.
b) Operations on a queue are performed in
order.
c) Insertion operation in a queue is called
and deletion operation in a queue is called
.
d) Deletion of elements is performed from
end of the queue.
e) Elements ‘A’,’S’,’D’ and ‘F’ are present in the queue, and
they are deleted one at a time,
is the sequence of element received.
f) is a data structure where elements
can be added or removed at either end, but not in
the middle.
g) A deque contains ‘z’,’x’,’c’,’v’ and ‘b’ . Elements
received after deletion are ‘z’,’b’,’v’,’x’ and ‘c’.
is the sequence of deletion
operation performed on deque.

2. Compare and contrast queue with stack.

3. How does FIFO describe queue?

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 NOTES 4. Write a menu driven python program using queue, to
implement movement of shuttlecock in it’s box.

5. How is queue data type different from deque data type?

6. Show the status of queue after each operation

enqueue(34)
enqueue(54)
dequeue()
enqueue(12)
dequeue()
enqueue(61)
peek()
dequeue()
dequeue()
dequeue()
dequeue()
enqueue(1)
7. Show the status of deque after each operation
peek()
insertFront(12)
insertRear(67)
deletionFront()
insertRear(43)
deletionRear()
deletionFront()
deletionRear()
8. Write a python program to check whether the given
string is palindrome or not, using deque. (Hint : refer to
algorithm 4.1)

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 h a pter
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5 Sortin
g
“Every one of today's smartphones has
thousands of times more processing power
than the computers that guided astronauts to
the moon.”
— Peter Thiel

In this Chapter
» Introduction
» Bubble Sort
» Selection Sort
» Insertion Sort 5.1 INTRODUCTION
» Time Complexity of
Algorithms Sorting is the process of ordering or arranging a
given collection of elements in some particular
order. We can sort a collection of numbers in
ascending (increasing) or descending (decreasing)
order. If the collection is of strings, we can sort it
in an alphabetical order (a-z or z-a) or according
to the length of the string. For example, words in
a dictionary are sorted in alphabetical order;
seats in an examination hall are ordered
according to candidates’ roll number. We can
also sort a list of students based on their height
or weight.
Imagine finding the meaning of a word from
a dictionary that is not ordered. We will have to
search for the word on each page till we find the
word, which will be very tedious. That is why
dictionaries have the words in alphabetical order
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and it ease
the process of
searching.

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 Sorting a large number of items can take a substantial
Can you identify amount of time. However, this extra time (called
other examples overhead) is worth when compared to the amount of
where sorting plays
an important role in
time needed to find an element from an unsorted list.
computers? Sorting is an important area of study in computer
science, and many sorting algorithms have been
developed and analysed from their performance point of
view. In this chapter, we will learn about three sorting
methods and implement them using Python. Bubble sort
is discussed in section 5.2, followed by discussion on
selection sort and insertion sort in section 5.3 and 5.4,
respectively

5.2 BUBBLE SORT

The first sorting technique we are going to understand is
Bubble sort. It sorts a given list of elements by repeatedly
comparing the adjacent elements and swapping them
if they are unordered. Swapping two elements means
changing their positions with each other. In algorithm,
every iteration through each element of a list is called
a pass. For a list with n elements, the bubble sort
makes a total of n – 1 passes to sort the list. In each
pass, the required pairs of adjacent elements of the list
will be compared. In order to arrange elements in
ascending order, the largest element is identified after
each pass and placed at the correct position in the list.
This can be considered as the largest element being
‘bubbled up’. Hence the name Bubble sort. This sorted
element is not considered in the remaining passes and
In Figure 5.1, we can thus the list of elements gets reduced in successive
see that the list got
sorted in the 4th pass passes.
itself. Still the bubble
sort technique made Figure 5.1 demonstrates the working of the bubble
a redundant 5th pass sort method to arrange a list in ascending order. Let
which did not result us consider a list having 6 elements as numList = [8,
in any swap. If there 7, 13, 1, -9, 4]. In the figure, elements being compared
is no swapping in any
are highlighted with blue colour and sorted elements
pass, it means the
list is already sorted, are highlighted with green colour. To begin sorting,
hence the sorting the element at index 0 is compared with the element at
operation needs to index 1. If the first element is bigger, it is swapped with
be stopped. Can you the second. Else, no change is done. Next, the element
think of making any at index 1 is compared with the element at index 2. This
improvement in the
Algorithm 5.1 so that continues till the end of the list is reached. After the
it stops when the list first pass, the largest element will reach the end of the
becomes sorted? list as shown in Figure 5.1 with green colour.

68 COMPUTER SCIENCE - CLASS XII

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 numList
8 7 13 1 -9 4
Index
0 1 2 3 4 5

Comparison in Pass 1 Comparison in Pass 2

Swap No Change

8 7 13 1 -9 4 7 8 1 -9 4 13

No Change Swap

7 8 13 1 -9 4 7 8 1 -9 4 13

Swap Swap

7 8 13 1 -9 4 7 1 8 -9 4 13

Swap Swap

7 8 1 13 -9 4 7 1 -9 8 4 13

Swap Swap

7 8 1 -9 13 4 7 1 -9 4 8 13

7 8 1 -9 4 13

Comparison in Pass 3 Comparison in Pass 4

Swap Swap

7 1 -9 4 8 13 1 -9 4 7 8 13

Swap No Change

1 7 -9 4 8 13 -9 1 4 7 8 13

Swap

1 -9 7 4 8 13 -9 1 4 7 8 13

Swap

1 -9 4 7 8 13

SORTING 69
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 Comparison in Pass 5
Swap

-9 1 4 7 8 13

Indicates elements to be swapped

-9 1 4 7 8 13 Indicates elements already sorted

Figure 5.1: Comparisons done in different passes of Bubble sort

Algorithm 5.1 shows the steps followed for the bubble

sort that takes numList as a list of n elements, and
sorts the list in ascending order:
Activity 5.1
Algorithm 5.1: Bubble Sort
Algorithm 5.1 sorts a
list in ascending order. BUBBLESORT( numList, n)
Write a bubble sort
algorithm to sort a
Step 1: SET i = 0
list in descending
Step 2: WHILE i< n REPEAT STEPS 3 to 8
order?
Step 3: SET j = 0
Step 4: WHILE j< n-i-1,REPEAT STEPS 5 to 7
Step 5: IF numList[j] > numList[j+1] THEN
Step 6: swap(numList[j],numList[j+1])
Step 7: SET j=j+1
Step 8: SET i=i+1

Program 5-1 Implementation of bubble sort using Python.

def bubble_Sort(list1):
n = len(list1)
for i in range(n): # Number of passes
for j in range(0, n-i-1):
# size -i-1 because last i elements are already sorted
#in previous passes
if list1[j] > list1[j+1] :
# Swap element at jth position with (j+1)th position
list1[j], list1[j+1] = list1[j+1], list1[j]
numList = [8, 7, 13, 1, -9, 4]
bubble_Sort(numList)

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 print (“The sorted list is :”) Activity 5.2
for i in range(len(numList)): Apply bubble sort
print (numList[i], end=" ") technique to sort a list
of elements numList2
Output: = [8, 7, 6, 5, 4]. Show
The sorted list is : the positions of
elements in the list
-9 1 4 7 8 13 after each pass.
In which pass
the last swap
5.3 SELECTION SORT happens?
Selection sort is another sorting technique. To sort a
list having n elements, the selection sort makes (n-1)
number of passes through the list. The list is considered
to be divided into two lists -- the left list containing
the sorted elements, and the right list containing the
unsorted elements. Initially, the left list is empty, and
the right list contains all the elements.
For arranging elements in ascending order, in the first
pass, all the elements in the unsorted list are traversed
to find the smallest element. The smallest element is
then swapped with the leftmost element of the unsorted
list. This element occupies the first position in the
sorted list, and it is not considered in further passes. In
the second pass, the next smallest element is selected
from the remaining elements in the unsorted list and
swapped with the leftmost element of the unsorted list.
This element occupies the second position in the sorted
list, and the unsorted list reduces by one element for
the third pass.
This process continues until n-1 smallest elements
are found and moved to their respective places. The
nth element is the last, and it is already in place.
Figure
5.2 demonstrates the working of selection sort method
to arrange a list in ascending order. In this Figure,
elements being compared are shown using arrows and
the smaller element in a comparison is highlighted with
blue colour. The sorted elements are highlighted —

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 numList 8 7 13 1 -9 4
Index
0 1 2 3 4 5

Comparison in Pass 1
Comparison in Pass 2

8 7 13 1 -9 4 -9 8 7 13 1 4

8 7 13 1 -9 4 -9 8 7 13 1 4

8 7 13 1 -9 4 -9 8 7 13 1 4

8 7 13 1 -9 4 -9 8 7 13 1 4

-9 8 7 13 1 4
8 7 13 1 -9 4

Swap

8 7 13 1 -9 4
-9 1 7 13 8 4
Swa
p
-9 8 7 13 1 4

Comparison in Pass 3 Comparison in Pass 4

-9 1 7 13 8 4 -9 1 4 13 8 7

-9 1 7 13 8 4 -9 1 4 13 8 7

-9 1 7 13 8 4 -9 1 4 13 8 7

Swap

-9 1 7 13 8 4 -9 1 4 7 8 13
Swap

-9 1 4 13 8 7

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 Comparison in Pass 5

-9 1 4 7 8 13 Indicates the smaller element in a

comparisson
Indicates the elements in the sorted list
-9 1 4 7 8 13 Sorted List
Unsorted List

Indicates elements being compared

-9 1 4 7 8 13

Figure 5.2: Comparisons done in different passes of Selection sort

The following is an algorithm for the selection sort

that takes numList as a list consisting of n elements,
and sorts the list in ascending order:
Algorithm 5.2 shows the steps followed for the
selection sort that takes numList as a list of n
elements, and sorts the list in ascending order:
Algorithm 5.2: Selection Sort
SELECTIONSORT( numList, n)
Step 1: SET i=0
Step 2: WHILE i< n REPEAT STEPS 3 to 11
Step 3: SET min = i, flag = 0
Step 4: SET j= i+1
Step 5: WHILE j<n, REPEAT STEPS 6 to 10
Step 6: IF numList[j] < numList[min] THEN
Activity 5.3
Step 7: min = j
Consider a list of 10
Step 8: flag = 1 elements:
randList =
Step 9: IF flag = 1 THEN [7,11,3,10,17,23,1,4,21,5].
Determine the partially
Step 10: swap(numList[i],numList[min]) sorted list after
four complete
Step 11: SET i=i+1 passes of
selection sort.

SORTING 73
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Program 5-2 Implementation of selection sort using Python.
def selection_Sort(list2):
flag = 0 #to decide when to swap
n=len(list2)
for i in range(n): # Traverse through all list elements
min = i
for j in range(i + 1, len(list2)): #the left elements
#are already sorted in previous passes
if list2[j] < list2[min]: # element at j is smaller
#than the current min element
min = j
flag = 1
if flag == 1 : # next smallest element is found
list2[min], list2[i] = list2[i], list2[min]

numList = [8, 7, 13, 1, -9, 4]

selection_Sort(numList)
print ("The sorted list is :")
for i in range(len(numList)):
print (numList[i], end=" ")

Output:
The sorted list is :
-9 1 4 7 8 13

5.4 INSERTION SORT

Insertion sort is another sorting algorithm that can
arrange elements of a given list in ascending or
descending order. Like Selection sort, in Insertion sort
also, the list is divided into two parts - one of sorted
elements and another of unsorted elements. Each
element in the unsorted list is considered one by one
and is inserted into the sorted list at its appropriate
position. In each pass, the sorted list is traversed from
the backward direction to find the position where the
unsorted element could be inserted. Hence the sorting
method is called insertion sort.
In pass 1, the unsorted list has n-1 elements and the
sorted list has a single element (say element s). The first
element of the unsorted list (say element e) is compared
with the element s of sorted list. If element e is smaller
than element s, then element s is shifted to the right
making space for inserting element e. This shifting
will now make sorted list of size 2 and unsorted list of
size n-2.
In pass 2, the first element (say element e) of unsorted
list will be compared with each element of sorted list

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starting from the backward direction till the appropriate
position for insertion is found. The elements of sorted
list will be shifted towards right making space for the
element e where it could be inserted.
This continues till all the elements in unsorted lists
are inserted at appropriate positions in the sorted list.
This results into a sorted list in which elements are
arranged in ascending order.
Figure 5.3 demonstrates the working of the insertion
sort to arrange a list in ascending order.

numList 8 7 13 1 -9 4
Index
0 1 2 3 4 5

Comparison in Pass 1 Comparison in Pass 2

No Change

8 7 13 1 -9 4 7 8 13 1 -9 4

Swap

8 7 13 1 -9 4 7 8 13 1 -9 4

7 8 13 1 -9 4

Comparison in Pass 3 Comparison in Pass 4

Swap Swap

7 8 13 1 -9 4 1 7 8 13 -9 4

Swap Swap

7 8 1 13 -9 4 1 7 8 -9 13 4
Swap
Swap

7 1 8 13 -9 4 1 7 -9 8 13 4
Swap

1 7 8 13 -9 4 -9 1 7 8 13 4

-9 1 7 8 13 4

SORTING 75
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 Comparison in Pass 5
Swap
Indicates element(s) in sorted list
-9 1 7 8 13 4
Swap

-9 1 7 8 4 13
Swap

-9 1 7 4 8 13
No Change

-9 1 4 7 8 13

-9 1 4 7 8 13
Figure 5.3: Comparisons done in different passes of Insertion sort

Let us consider that numList is a list consisting

of n elements. Algorithm 5.3 sorts the list numList in
ascending order using insertion sort technique.

Algorithm 5.3: Insertion Sort

INSERTIONSORT( numList, n)
Step 1: SET i=1
Step 2: WHILE i< n REPEAT STEPS 3 to 9

Activity 5.4
Step 3: temp = numList[i]
Consider a list of 10 Step 4: SET j = i-1
elements:
Array = Step 5: WHILE j> = 0 and numList[j]>temp,REPEAT
[7,11,3,10,17,23,1,4,21,5] STEPS 6 to 7
Determine the partially
sorted list after Step 6: numList[j+1] = numList[j]
three complete
passes of Step 7: SET j=j-1
insertion sort.
Step 8: numList[j+1] = temp #insert
temp at position j
Step 9: set i=i+1

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Program 5-3 Implementation of insertion sort using
Python.

def insertion_Sort(list3):
n= len(list3)
for i in range(n): # Traverse through all elements
temp = list3[i]
j = i-1
while j >=0 and temp< list3[j] :
list3[j+1] = list3[j]
j = j-1
list3[j+1] = temp

numList = [8, 7, 13, 1, -9, 4]

insertion_Sort(numList)
print (“The sorted list is :”)
for i in range(len(numList)):
print (numList[i], end=" ")

Output:
The sorted list is :
-9 1 4 7 8 13

5.5 TIME COMPLEXITY OF ALGORITHMS

We have studied that there can be more than one
approach to solve a problem using a computer. In Class
XI, we compared four different algorithms to check
whether a given number is prime or not. For the same
problem, one algorithm may require more processing
time than the other. The amount of time an algorithm
takes to process a given data can be called its time
complexity.
For a small set of data elements shown in examples
of this chapter so far, the time and memory required
by different algorithms do not differ significantly.
However, in the real world, sorting algorithms are
required to work on huge amounts of data. In such
cases, the total time utilisation becomes significant,
and therefore it is important to consider the time
complexity of an algorithm before being used in a real
world data set.
Computer scientists proposing different techniques
for sorting are always interested to find out their time
complexity. The aim is to find out how a sorting
algorithm behaves if the order of input elements changes
or if the number of elements in the list increases or
decreases. Such comparisons help to decide which
algorithm is more suitable for which kind of data and
Sapplication.
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 NOTES Calculating the complexity of different algorithms
involves mathematical calculations and detailed
analysis, and it is beyond the scope of this textbook to
discuss them in detail. However, we will discuss some
basics of complexity to get some ideas. The following
tips will guide us in estimating the time complexity of
an algorithm.
• Any algorithm that does not have any loop will have
time complexity as 1 since the number of instructions
to be executed will be constant, irrespective of the
data size. Such algorithms are known as Constant
time algorithms.
• Any algorithm that has a loop (usually 1 to n) will
have the time complexity as n because the loop will
execute the statement inside its body n number of
times. Such algorithms are known as Linear time
algorithms.
• A loop within a loop (nested loop) will have the
time complexity as n2. Such algorithms are known
as Quadratic time algorithms.
• If there is a nested loop and also a single loop, the
time complexity will be estimated on the basis of the
nested loop only.
Now, look at the Python programs of the three sorting
techniques discussed in this chapter, you will notice
that in each of the three programs, there is a nested
loop, i.e., one inside another. So according to the above
rules, all the sorting algorithms namely, bubble sort,
selection sort and insertion sort have a time
complexity of n2.

SUMMARY
• The process of placing or rearranging a collection
of elements into a particular order is known as
sorting.
• Bubble sort is the simplest sorting algorithm
that works by repeatedly swapping the adjacent
elements in case they are unordered in n-1 passes.
• In Selection Sort, the smallest element is selected
from the unsorted array and swapped with the

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 leftmost element, and that element becomes a NOTES
part of the sorted array. The process continues
for the next element in the unsorted array till the
list is sorted.
• Insertion Sort places the element of a list at
its suitable place in each pass. It is similar to
the placing of cards at its right position while
playing cards.
• Complexity analysis is performed to explain
how an algorithm will perform when the input
grows larger.

EXERCISE
1. Consider a list of 10 elements:
numList =[7,11,3,10,17,23,1,4,21,5].
Display the partially sorted list after three complete
passes of Bubble sort.

2. Identify the number of swaps required for sorting the

following list using selection sort and bubble sort and
identify which is the better sorting technique with
respect to the number of comparisons.

List 1 : 63 42 21 9

3. Consider the following

lists: List 1:2 3 5 7 11

List 2: 11 7 5 3 2

If the lists are sorted using Insertion sort then

which of the lists List1 or List 2 will make the minimum
number of comparisons? Justify using diagrammatic
representation.
4. Write a program using user defined functions that
accepts a List of numbers as an argument and finds its
median. (Hint : Use bubble sort to sort the accepted list.
If there are odd number of terms, the median is the
center term. If there are even number of terms, add the
two middle terms and divide by 2 get median)

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 NOTES 5. All the branches of XYZ school conducted an aptitude
test for all the students in the age group 14 - 16. There
were a total of n students. The marks of n students are
stored in a list. Write a program using a user defined
function that accepts a list of marks as an argument
and calculates the ‘xth’ percentile (where x is any number
between 0 and 100).You are required to perform the
following steps to be able to calculate the ‘xth’ percentile.
Note: Percentile is a measure of relative performance i.e. It is
calculated based on a candidate’s performance with respect
to others. For example : If a candidate's score is in the 90th
percentile, that means she/he scored better than 90% of
people who took the test.

Steps to calculate the xth percentile:

I. Order all the values in the data set from smallest to
largest using Selection Sort. In general any of the
sorting methods can be used.
II. Calculate index by multiplying x percent
by the total number of values, n.
For example: to find 90th percentile for 120 students:
0.90*120 = 108
III. Ensure that the index is a whole number by using
math.round()

VI. Display the value at the index obtained in Step 3.

The corresponding value in the list is the xth percentile.

6. During admission in a course, the names of the

students are inserted in ascending order. Thus,
performing the sorting operation at the time of
inserting elements in a list. Identify the type of sorting
technique being used and write a program using a user
defined function that is invoked every time a name is
input and stores the name in ascending order of names
in the list.

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 h a pter
C
6 Searchin
g
“Even though most people won't be directly
involved with programming, everyone is affected
by computers, so an educated person should have
a good understanding of how computer
hardware, software, and networks
operate.”
— Brian Kernighan
In this Chapter
» Introduction
» Linear Search
» Binary Search
6.1 INTRODUCTION
» Search by Hashing
We store many things in our home and find them
out later as and when required. Sometimes we
remember the exact location of a required item.
But, sometimes we do not remember the exact
location and in that case we need to search for
the required item. A computer also stores lots of
data to be retrieved later as and when demanded
by a user or a program.
Searching means locating a particular
element in a collection of elements. Search result
determines whether that particular element is
present in the collection or not. If it is present,
we can also find out the position of that element
in the given collection. Searching is an important
technique in computer science. In order to design
algorithms, programmers need to understand the
different ways in which a collection of data can be
searched for retrieval.
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 6.2 LINEAR SEARCH
Linear search is the most fundamental and the
simplest search method. It is an exhaustive searching
technique where every element of a given list is
compared with the item to be searched (usually
referred to as ‘key’). So, each element in the list is
compared one by one with the key. This process
continues until an element matching the key is found
and we declare that the search is successful. If no
element matches the key and we have traversed the
entire list, we declare the search is unsuccessful i.e.,
the key is not present in the list. This item by item
comparison is done in the order, in which the elements
are present in the list, beginning at the first element of
the list and moving towards the last. Thus, it is also
called sequential search or serial search. This
technique is useful for collection of items that are
small in size and are unordered.
Given a list numList of n elements and key value K,
Algorithm 6.1 uses a linear search algorithm to find the
position of the key K in numList.

Algorithm 6.1 : Linear Search

LinearSearch(numList, key, n)
Step 1: SET index = 0
Step 2: WHILE index < n, REPEAT Step 3
Activity 6.1 Step 3: IF numlist[index]= key THEN
Consider a list of 15 PRINT “Element found at position”, index+1
elements: STOP
L=[2,3,9,7,- ELSE
6,11,12,17,45,23,29,
31,-37,41,43]. index = index+1
Determine the number Step 4: PRINT “Search unsuccessful”
of comparisons
linear search Example 6.1 Assume that the numList has seven elements
makes to search [8, -4, 7, 17, 0, 2, 19] so, n = 7. We need to search for the key,
for key = 12. say 17 in numList. Table 6.1 shows the elements in the
given list along with their index values.
Table 6.1 Elements in numList alongwith their index value

Index in numList 0 1 2 3 4 5 6
Value 8 -4 7 17 0 2 19

The step-by-step process of linear search using

Algorithm 6.1. is given in Table 6.2.

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Table 6.2 Linear search for key 17 in numList of Table 6.1

index index < n numLiß[index]= key index=index+1

0 0 < 7 ? Yes 8 = 17? No 1
1 1 < 7 ? Yes -4 = 17? No 2
2 2 < 7 ? Yes 7 = 17? No 3
3 3 < 7 ? Yes 17 = 17? Yes

Observe that after four comparisons, the algorithm

found the key 17 and will display ‘Element found at
position 4’.
Let us now assume another arrangement of the
elements in numList as [17, 8, -4, 7, 0, 2, 19] and search
for the key K=17 in numList.
Table 6.3 Elements in numList alongwith their index value

Index in numList 0 1 2 3 4 5 6
Value 17 8 -4 7 0 2 19

Table 6.4 Linear search for key 17 in numList given in Table 6.3
numList[index]=
index index < n index=index+1
key
0 0 < 7 ? Yes 17 = 17? Yes 1

From Table 6.4, it is clear that the algorithm had

Activity 6.2
to make only 1 comparison to display ‘Element found
at position 1’. Thus, if the key to be searched is the In the list : L = [7,-1,
first element in the list, the linear search algorithm 11,32,17,19,23,29,31,
37,43]
will always have to make only 1 comparison. This is Determine the number
the minimum amount of work that the linear search of comparisons
algorithm would have to do. linear search takes
to search for key
Let us now assume another arrangement of the = 43.
elements in numList as [8, -4, 7, 0, 2, 19, 17] and search
for the key K =17 in numList.
On a dry run, we can find out that the linear search
algorithm has to compare each element in the list till
the end to display ‘Element found at position 7’. Thus,
if the key to be searched is the last element in the
list, the linear search algorithm will have to make n
comparisons, where n is the number of elements in the
list. This is in fact the maximum amount of work the
linear search algorithm would have to do.

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 Let us now assume another case, where the key
being searched is not present in the list. For example,
we are searching for key = 10 in the numList.
In this case also, the algorithm has to compare each
element in the list till the end to display ‘Element is
not found in the list’. Thus, if the key is not present in
the list, the linear search algorithm will have to make
n comparisons. This again is a case where maximum
work is done. Let us now understand the program of
a Linear Search. It takes a list of elements and the key
to be searched as input and returns either the position
of the element in the list or display that the key is not
present in the list.
Program 6-1 Linear Search

def linearSearch(list, key): #function to perform the search

for index in range(0,len(list)):
if list[index] == key: #key is present
return index+1 #position of key in list
return None #key is not in list
#end of function

list1 = [] #Create an empty list

maximum = int(input("How many elements in your list? "))
print("Enter each element and press enter: ")
for i in range(0,maximum):
n = int(input())
list1.append(n) #append elements to the list
print("The List contents are:", list1)

key = int(input("Enter the number to be searched:"))

position = linearSearch(list1, key)
if position is None:
print("Number",key,"is not present in the list")
else:
print("Number",key,"is present at position",position)

Output
How many elements in your list? 4
Enter each element and press enter:
12
23
3
-45
The List contents are: [12, 23, 3, -45]
Enter the number to be searched:23
Number 23 is present at position 2

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 NOTES
6.3 BINARY SEARCH
Consider a scenario where we have to find the meaning
of the word Zoology in an English dictionary. Where do
we search it in the dictionary?
1. in the first half?
2. around the middle?
3. in the second half?
It is certainly more prudent to look for the word in the
second half of the dictionary as the word starts with the
alphabet ‘Z’. On the other hand, if we were to find the
meaning of the word Biology, we would have searched
in the first half of the dictionary.
We were able to decide where to search in the
dictionary because we are aware of the fact that all words
in an English dictionary are placed in alphabetical order.
Taking advantage of this, we could avoid unnecessary
comparison through each word beginning from the first
word of the dictionary and moving towards the end till
we found the desired word. However, if the words in the
dictionary were not alphabetically arranged, we would
have to do linear search to find the meaning of a word.
The binary search is a search technique that makes
use of the ordering of elements in the list to quickly
search a key. For numeric values, the elements in the
list may be arranged either in ascending or descending
order of their key values. For textual data, it may
be arranged alphabetically starting from a to z or
from z to a.
In binary search, the key to be searched is compared
with the element in the middle of a sorted list. This
could result in either of the three possibilities:
i) the element at the middle position itself matches
the key or
ii) the element at the middle position is greater than
the key or
iii) the element at the middle position is smaller than
the key
If the element at the middle position matches the
key, we declare the search successful and the
searching process ends.

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 If the middle element is greater than the key it
means that if the key is present in the list, it must
We are using the surely be in the first half. We can thus straight away
term iteration and
ignore the second half of the list and repeat the
not comparison
in binary search, searching process only in the first half.
because after If the middle element is less than the key, it means
every unsuccessful
if the key is present in the list, it must be in the second
comparison, we
change the search half. We can thus straight away ignore the first half of
area redefining the list and repeat the searching process only in the
the first, mid and second half. This splitting and reduction in list size
last position before continued till the key is either found or the remaining
making subsequent
list consists of only one item. If that item is not the
comparisons.
key, then the search is unsuccessful as the key is not
in the list.
Thus, it is evident that unlike linear search of
elements one-by-one, we can search more efficiently
using binary search provided the list from which we
want to search is arranged in some order. That is, the
list needs to be sorted.
Activity 6.3
If the list to be searched contains an even number
Consider the numList of elements, the mid value is calculated using the floor
[17, 8, -4, 7, 0, 2,
19]. Sort it using division (//) operator. If there are 10 elements in the list,
the sort() function of then the middle position (mid) = 10//2 = 5. Therefore,
Python’s Lists. Now the sixth element in the list is considered the middle
apply binary search element as we know that the first element in list has
to search for the index value 0. If required, the list is further divided into
key 7. Determine
the number two parts where the first half contains 5 elements and
of iterations the second half contains 4 elements.
required. It is interesting to note that the intermediate
comparisons which do not find the key still give us
information about the part of the list where the key
may be found! They reveal whether the key is before or
after the current middle position in the list, and we use
this information to narrow down or reduce our search
Activity 6.4 area. Thus, each unsuccessful comparison reduces the
Consider a list [-4, 0, number of elements remaining to be searched by half,
2, 7, 8, 17, 19]. Apply hence the name binary search. Let us now discuss the
binary search to find algorithm of binary search.
element -4. Determine
the number of key Given a list numList of n elements and key value K,
comparisons Algorithm 6.2 shows steps for finding position of the
required. key K in the numList using binary search algorithm.

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Algorithm 6.2: Binary Search
BinarySearch(numList, key)
Step 1: SET first = 0, last = n-1
Step 2: Calculate mid = (first+last)//2
Step 3: WHILE first <= last REPEAT Step 4 The binary search
algorithm does
Step 4: IF numList[mid] = key not change the
PRINT “Element found at position”, list. Rather, after
" mid+1 every pass of the
algorithm, the
STOP search area gets
ELSE reduced by half.
IF numList[mid] > key, THEN last That is, only the
= mid-1 index of the
element to be
ELSE first = mid + 1 compared with the
Step 5: PRINT “Search unsuccessful” key changes in each
iteration.
Example 6.2 Consider a sorted list comprising of 15 elements:
numList = [2,3,5,7,10,11,12,17,19,23,29,31,3
7,41,43]
We need to search for the key, say 17 in numList. The
first, middle and last element identified in numList
alongwith their index values are shown in Table 6.5.

Table 6.5 Elements in sorted numList alongwith their index value

first mid last
Index in 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14
numList
Value 2 3 5 7 10 11 12 17 19 23 29 31 37 41 43

Table 6.6 Working of binary search using steps given in Algorithm 6.2.
first <=
first last mid numList[mid] == K key < Lmid? last
0 14 (0+14)// Not known Not known 0 <= 14?
At Start
2=7 True
0 14 7 17 = 17? Key is
Iteration Yes found. The
1 search
terminates

Note that the algorithm had to make only 1 iteration

to display ‘Element found at position 8’. This is because
the key being searched is the middle element in the list.
Thus, binary search requires only 1 iteration when the
key to be searched is the middle value in the list. This

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 is the minimum amount of work binary search would
have to do to confirm that a key is present in the list.
Now, let us search for key 2 in the list.
numList = [2,3,5,7,10,11,12,17,19,23,29,3
Activity 6.5 1,37,41,43]
For L = [2,3,5,7,10,1 In the first iteration, we have the mid value as 17.
1,12,17,19,23,29,31, As 2 is smaller than the mid value (17), we have to
37,41,43]. Fill up the search for the first half of the list in the second
Table 6.8 for the given iteration. We now consider only 7 elements. As 2 is
key values 2, 43, 17
and 9. What do you
smaller than the new mid value (7), we have to search
infer from Table 6.8 for the first half of the remaining list in the third
regarding performance iteration. We now consider only 3 elements. Observe
of both the that the number of elements in the numList is halved
algorithms in each time. It reduces from 15 elements in iteration 1
different cases?
to 7 elements in iteration 2, and to 3 elements in
iteration 3. In the 3rd iteration, the algorithm finds
that key 2 is smaller than the new mid value (3), we
have to search in the first half of the remaining list.
The list now has only 1 element in the fourth iteration
and on comparison, it is found that the element is the
same as key. Hence, the search terminates successfully
and returns the position of key. Steps followed for
binary search are given in Table 6.7.
Table 6.7 Searching key = 2 in the numList using binary search
numList]
first last mid mid] == K K < numList[mid] first <= last

0 14 (0+14)//2= Not known Not known True

At Start
7
0 14 (0+14)//2= 17 = 2? 2 < 17? 0 <= 14?
Iteration 1 7 No True True

0 6 (0+6)//2= 3 7 = 2? 2 < 7? 0 <= 6?

Iteration 2 No True True

0 2 (0+2)//2= 1 3 = 2? 2 < 3? 0 <= 2?

Iteration 3 No True True

0 0 (0+0)//2= 0 2 = 2? Key found, search

Iteration 4 Yes Terminates, return
position as (mid+1)=1

As we can see, the binary search algorithm had to

make 4 iterations to narrow down the list to a single
element and decide that the search key is the first
element of list. This is clearly the maximum work
required to find a key in the given list.

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Program 6-2 Binary Search

def binarySearch(list, key):

first = 0
last = len(list) - 1
while(first <= last):
mid = (first + last)//2
if list[mid] == key:
return mid
elif key > list[mid]:
first = mid + 1
elif key < list[mid]:
last = mid - 1
return -1

list1 = [] #Create an empty list

print ("Create a list by entering elements in ascending order")
print ("press enter after each element, press -999 to stop")
num = int(input())
while num!=-999:
list1.append(num)
num = int(input())
n = int(input("Enter the key to be searched: "))
pos = binarySearch(list1,n)
if(pos != -1):
print( n,"is found at position", pos+1)
else:
print (n,"is not found in the list ")

Output
Create a list by entering elements in ascending order
press enter after each element, press -999 to stop
1
3
4
5
-999
Enter the number to be searched: 4
4 is found at position 3

Second run of the program with different data:

Create a list by entering elements in ascending order
press enter after each element, press -999 to stop
12
8
3
-999
Enter the number to be searched: 4
4 is not found in the list

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 6.3.1 Applications of Binary Search
• Binary search has numerous applications including
– searching a dictionary or a telephone directory,
finding the element with minimum value or maximum
value in a sorted list, etc.
• Modified binary search techniques have far
reaching applications such as indexing in databases,
implementing routing tables in routers, data
compression code, etc.

6.4 SEARCH BY HASHING

Hashing is a technique which can be used to know the
presence of a key in a list in just one step. The idea is if
we already know the value at every index position in a
list, it would require only a single comparison to check
the presence or absence of a key in that list. Hashing
Suppose a list has makes searching operations very efficient. A formula
more than one called hash function is used to calculate the value at an
element whose
index in the list.
modulo division
results in same Thus, a hash function takes elements of a list one
remainder value. In by one and generates an index value for every element.
such situations, what
This will generate a new list called the hash table. Each
kind of hashing may
be useful? index of the hash table can hold only one item and the
positions are indexed by integer values starting from 0.
Note that the size of the hash table can be larger than
the size of the list.
A simple hash function that works with numeric
values is known as the remainder method. It takes
an element from a list and divides it by the size of the
hash table. The remainder so generated is called the
hash value.
h(element) = element % size(hash table)
We can easily implement a hash table using a
Python’s List. Let us consider an empty hash table
having 10 positions as shown in Table 6.8:
Table 6.8 An Empty hash table with 10 positions
Index/ 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
position
Value None None None None None None None None None None

Let us consider a list of numbers (34, 16, 2, 93,

80, 77, 51). We can use the hash function remainder

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method explained earlier to create a hash table as
shown in Table 6.9.

Table 6.9 hash function element % 10 applied on the elements of list

Element 34 16 2 93 80 77 51

Hash Value 34%10=4 16%10=6 2%10=2 93%10=3 80%10=0 77%10=7 51%10=1

After computing the hash values, each element is

inserted at its designated position in the hash table
shown in Table 6.10
Table 6.10 hash table generated for elements given in Table 6.10

index 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

Value 80 51 2 93 34 None 16 77 None None

Now, to search for a key, we can calculate its index

using the hashing function and compare the element at
that index with the key to declare whether the element is
present in the list or not. This search operation involves
just one comparison and hence the same amount of
time is always required to search a key irrespective of
the size of the list.
Program 6-3 Use of hashing to find a key in the given list L

#Function to check if a key is present or not

def hashFind(key,hashTable):
if (hashTable[key % 10] == key): #key is present
return ((key % 10)+1) #return the position
else:
return None #key is not present
#end of function

#create hashTable with 10 empty positions

hashTable=[None, None, None, None, None, None, None, None, None,
None]
print("We have created a hashTable of 10 positions:")
print(hashTable)

L = [34, 16, 2, 93, 80, 77, 51]

print("The given list is", L[::] )

# Apply hash function

for i in range(0,len(L)):
hashTable[L[i]%10] = L[i]

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 print("The hash table contents are: " )
for i in range(0,len(hashTable)):
print("hashindex=", i," , value =", hashTable[i])

key = int(input("Enter the number to be searched:"))

position = hashFind(key,hashTable)
if position is None:
print("Number",key,"is not present in the hash table")
else:
print("Number ",key," present at ",position, " position")

Output:
We have created a hashTable of 10 positions:
[None, None, None, None, None, None, None, None, None, None]
The given list is [34, 16, 2, 93, 80, 77, 51]
The hash table contents are:
hashindex= 0 , value = 80
hashindex= 1 , value = 51
hashindex= 2 , value = 2
hashindex= 3 , value = 93
hashindex= 4 , value = 34
hashindex= 5 , value = None
hashindex= 6 , value = 16
hashindex= 7 , value = 77
hashindex= 8 , value = None
hashindex= 9 , value = None
Enter the number to be searched:16
Number 16 present at 7 position

6.4.1 COLLISION
The hashing technique works fine if each element of the
list maps to a unique location in the hash table. Consider
a list [34, 16, 2, 26, 80]. While applying the
hash function say, list [i]%10, two elements (16 and
26) would have a hash value 6. This is a problematic
situation, because according to our definition, two or
more elements cannot be in the same position in the
list. This situation is called collision in hashing.
We must have a mechanism for placing the other
items with the same hash value in the hash table. This
process is called collision resolution. Collision can be
resolved in many ways, but it is beyond the scope of
this book to discuss collision resolution methods.

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 If every item of the list maps to a unique index in
NOTES
the hash table, the hash function is called a perfect
hash function. If a hash function is perfect, collision will
never occur.
Apart from modulo division method, hash functions
may be based on several other techniques like integer
division, shift folding, boundary folding, mid-square
function, extraction, radix transformation, etc.
Again, it is beyond the scope of this book to discuss
these methods.
The time taken by different hash functions may be
different, but it remains constant for a particular hash
function. The advantage of hashing is that the time
required to compute the index value is independent of
the number of items in the search list. It is to remember
that the cost of computing a hash function must be
small enough to make a hashing-based searching more
efficient than other search methods.

SUMMARY
• Searching means trying to locate a particular
element called key in a collection of elements.
Search specifies whether that key is present in
the collection or not. Also, if the key is present, it
tells the position of that key in the given
collection.
• Linear search checks the elements of a list, one at
a time, without skipping any element. It is useful
when we need to search for an item in a small
unsorted list, but it is slow and time-consuming
when the list contains a large number of items.
The time taken to search the list increases as the
size of the list increases.
• Binary search takes a sorted/ordered list and
divides it in the middle. It then compares the
middle element with the key to be searched. If
the middle element matches the key, the search
is declared successful and the program ends. If
the middle element is greater than the key, the
search repeats only in the first half of the list.
If the middle element is lesser than the key, the
search repeats only in the second half of the list.

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 NOTES This splitting and reduction in list size continue
till the key is found or the remaining list consists
of only one item.
• In binary search, comparisons that do not find
the key still give us idea about the location
where the key may probably be found! They
reveal whether the key is before or after the
current middle position in the list, and we can use
this information to narrow down or reduce our
searching efforts.
• Hash based searching requires only one key
comparison to discover the presence or absence
of a key, provided every element is present at its
designated position decided by a hash function.
It calculates the position of the key in the list
using a formula called the hash function and the
key itself.
• When two elements map to the same slot in the
hash table, it is called collision.
• The process of identifying a slot for the second
and further items in the hash table in the event
of collision, is called collision resolution.
• A perfect hash function maps every input key
to a unique index in the hash table. If the hash
function is perfect, collisions will never occur.
1. Using linear search determine the position of 8, 1, 99
and 44 in the list:
E XERCISE
[1, -2, 32, 8, 17, 19, 42, 13, 0, 44]

Draw a detailed table showing the values of the

variables and the decisions taken in each pass of linear
search.

2. Use the linear search program to search the key with

value 8 in the list having duplicate values such as [42,
-2, 32, 8, 17, 19, 42, 13, 8, 44]. What is
the
position returned? What does this mean?
3. Write a program that takes as input a list having a mix
of 10 negative and positive numbers and a key value.

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 Apply linear search to find whether the key is present in
the list or not. If the key is present it should display the
NOTES
position of the key in the list otherwise it should print
an appropriate message. Run the program for at least 3
different keys and note the result.
4. Write a program that takes as input a list of 10 integers
and a key value and applies binary search to find
whether the key is present in the list or not. If the key is
present it should display the position of the key in the
list otherwise it should print an appropriate message.
Run the program for at least 3 different key values and
note the results.

5. Following is a list of unsorted/unordered numbers:

[50, 31, 21, 28, 72, 41, 73, 93, 68, 43, 45,
78,
5, 17, 97, 71, 69, 61, 88, 75, 99, 44, 55,9]
• Use linear search to determine the position of 1, 5,
55 and 99 in the list. Also note the number of key
comparisons required to find each of these numbers
in the list.
• Use a Python function to sort/arrange the list in
ascending order.
• Again, use linear search to determine the position of
1, 5, 55 and 99 in the list and note the number of
key comparisons required to find these numbers in
the list.
• Use binary search to determine the position of 1, 5,
55 and 99 in the sorted list. Record the number of
iterations required in each case.

6. Write a program that takes as input the following

unsorted list of English words:
[Perfect, Stupendous, Wondrous, Gorgeous, Awesome,
Mirthful, Fabulous, Splendid, Incredible,
OutIanding, Propitious, Remarkable, Stellar,
Unbelievable, Super, Amazing].
• Use linear search to find the position of Amazing,
Perfect, Great and Wondrous in the list.
Also note the number of key comparisons required to
find these words in the list.
• Use a Python function to sort the list.
• Again, use linear search to determine the position of
Amazing, Perfect, Great and Wondrous in
the list and note the number of key comparisons
required to find these words in the list.
• Use binary search to determine the position of
Amazing, Perfect, Great and Wondrous in
the sorted list. Record the number of iterations
required in each case.

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 NOTES 7. Estimate the number of key comparisons required in
binary search and linear search if we need to find the
details of a person in a sorted database having 230
(1,073,741,824) records when details of the person being
searched lies at the middle position in the database.
What do you interpret from your findings?

8. Use the hash function: h(element)= element%11

to store the collection of numbers: [44, 121, 55,
33, 110, 77, 22, 66] in a hash table. Display
the hash table created. Search if the values 11, 44,
88 and 121 are present in the hash table, and display
the search results.
9. Write a Python program by considering a mapping of list
of countries and their capital cities such as:

CountryCapital= {'India':'New Delhi','UK':

'London','France':'Paris',
'Switzerland': 'Berne',
'Australia': 'Canberra'}
Let us presume that our hash function is the length
of the Country Name. Take two lists of appropriate size:
one for keys (Country) and one for values (Capital). To put
an element in the hash table, compute its hash code by
counting the number of characters in Country, then put
the key and value in both the lists at the corresponding
indices. For example, India has a hash code of 5. So, we
store India at the 5th position (index 4) in the keys list,
and New Delhi at the 5th position (index 4) in the values
list and so on. So that we end up with:
hash index = length
List of Keys List of Values
of key - 1
0 None None
1 UK London
2 None None
3 Cuba Havana
4 India New Delhi
5 France Paris
6 None None
7 None None
8 AuIralia Canberra
9 None None
10 Switzerland Berne

Now search the capital of India, France and the USA

in the hash table and display your result.

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 h a pter
C
7 Understanding
Data
“Data is not information, Information
is not knowledge, Knowledge is not
understanding, Understanding is not
wisdom.”
— Gary Schubert

In this Chapter
» Introduction to Data
» Data Collection
» Data Storage 7.1 INTRODUCTION TO DATA
» Data Processing Many a time, people take decisions based on
» Statistical Techniques for certain data or information. For example, while
Data Processing choosing a college for getting admission, one looks
at placement data of previous years of that college,
educational qualification and experience of the
faculty members, laboratory and hostel facilities,
fees, etc. So we can say that identification of a
college is based on various data and their analysis.
Governments systematically collect and record
data about the population through a process
called census. Census data contains valuable
information which are helpful is planning and
formulating policies. Likewise, the coaching staff
of a sports team analyses previous performances
of opponent teams for making strategies. Banks
maintain data about the customers, their
account details and transactions. All these
examples highlight the need of data in various
fields. Data are indeed crucial for decision
making.
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 In the previous examples, one cannot make
decisions by looking at the data itself. In our example
of choosing a college, suppose the placement cell of the
college has maintained data of about 2000 students
placed with different companies at different salary
packages in the last 3 years. Looking at such data, one
cannot make any remark about the placement of
students of that college. The college processes and
analyses this data and the results are given in the
placement brochure of the college through
summarisation as well as visuals for easy
understanding. Hence, data need to be gathered,
processed and analysed for making decisions.
A knowledge base is In general, data is a collection of characters, numbers,
a store of information and other symbols that represents values of some
consisting of facts, situations or variables. Data is plural and singular of
assumptions and
rules which an AI the word data is “datum”. Using computers, data are
system can use for stored in electronic forms because data processing
decision making. becomes faster and easier as compared to manual data
processing done by people. The Information and
Communication Technology (ICT) revolution led by
computer, mobile and Internet has resulted in
generation of large volume of data and at a very fast
pace. The following list contains some examples of
data that we often come across.
• Name, age, gender, contact details, etc., of a person
• Transactions data generated through banking,
ticketing, shopping, etc. whether online or offline
• Images, graphics, animations, audio, video
• Documents and web pages
• Online posts, comments and messages
• Signals generated by sensors
• Satellite data including meteorological data,
communication data, earth observation data, etc.

7.1.1 Importance of Data

Human beings rely on data for making decisions.
Besides, large amount of data when processed with the
help of a computer, show us the possibilities or hidden
traits which are otherwise not visible to humans.
When one withdraws money from ATM, the bank needs
to debit the withdrawn amount from the linked
account. So the bank needs to maintain data and
update it as and when required. The meteorological
offices continuously keep on monitoring satellite data
for any upcoming cyclone or heavy rain.
98
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 In a competitive business environment, it is important defined format is
for business organisations to continuously monitor called structured
and analyse market behaviour with respect to their data. Structured
products and take actions
accordingly. Besides, companies identify
customer demands as well as feedbacks, and make
changes in their products or services accordingly. The
dynamic pricing concept used by airlines and
railway is another example where they decide the
price based on relationships between demand and
supply. The cab booking Apps increase or decrease
the price based on demand for cabs at a particular
time. Certain restaurants offer discounted price (called
happy hours), they decide when and how much
discount to offer by
analysing sales data at different time periods.
Besides business, following are some other scenarios
where data are also stored and analysed for making
decisions:
• The electronic voting machines are used for recording
the votes cast. Subsequently, the voting data from
all the machines are accumulated to declare
election results in a short time as compared to
manual counting of ballot papers.
• Scientists record data while doing experiments to
calculate and compare results.
• Pharmaceutical companies record data while trying
out a new medicine to see its effectiveness.
• Libraries maintain data about books in the library
and the membership of the library.
• The search engines give us results after analysing
large volume of data available on the websites across
World Wide Web (www).
• Weather alerts are generated by analysing data
received from various satellites.
7.1.2 Types of Data
As data come from different sources, they can be in
different formats. For example, an image is a collection
of pixels; a video is made up of frames; a fee slip is
made up of few numeric and non-numeric entries; and
messages/chats are made up of texts, icons
(emoticons) and images/videos. Two broad categories
in which data can be classified on the basis of their
format are:
(A) Structured Data
Data which DisATAorganised and can be recorded in a well
UNDERSTANDING 99
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NOTES

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 Activity 7.1 data is usually stored in computer in a tabular (in rows
Observe Voter Identity and columns) format where each column represents
cards of your family different data for a particular parameter called attribute/
members and identify characteristic/variable and each row represents data
the data fields under of an observation for different attributes. Table 7.1
which data are shows structured data related to an inventory of
organised. Are
they same for kitchen items maintained by a shop.
all?

Table 7.1 Structured data about kitchen items in a shop

ModelNo ProductName Unit Price Discount(%) Items_in_Inventory
ABC1 Water bottle 126 8 13
ABC2 Melamine Plates 320 5 45
ABC3 Dinner Set 4200 10 8
GH67 Jug 80 0 10
GH78 Table Spoon 120 5 14
GH81 Bucket 190 12 6
NK2 Kitchen Towel 25 0 32

Given this data, using a spreadsheet or other such

software, the shop owner can find out how many total
items are there by summing the column Items_in_
Inventory of Table 7.1 The owner of the shop can also
calculate the total value of all items in the inventory
by multiplying each entry of column 3 (Unit Price) with
corresponding entry of column 5 (Items_in_Inventory)
and finding their sum.
Table 7.2 shows more examples of structured data
recorded for different attributes.
Table 7.2 Attributes maintained for different activities
Entity/Activities Data Fields/Parameters/Attributes
Books at a shop BookTitle, Author, Price, YearofPublication
Depositing fees in a school StudentName, Class, RollNo, FeesAmount, DepositDate
Amount withdrawal from ATM AccHolderName, AccountNo, TypeofAcc, DateofWithdrawal,
AmountWithdrawn, ATMid, TimeOfWithdrawal

(B) Unstructured Data

A newspaper contains various types of news items
which are also called data. But there is no fixed pattern
that a newspaper follows in placing news articles. One
day there might be three images of different sizes on
a page along with five news items and one or more
advertisements. While on another day there, might be
one big image with three textual news items. So there is

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no particular format nor any fixed structure for
printing news. Another example is the content of an
email. There is no fixed structure about how many
lines or paragraphs one has to write in an email or
how many files are to be attached with an email. In
summary, data which are not in the traditional row
and column structure is called unstructured data.
Examples of unstructured data include web pages
consisting of text as well as multimedia contents
(image, graphics, audio/video). Other examples include
When we click a
text documents, business reports, books, audio/video photograph using
files, social media messages. Although there are ways our digital or mobile
to process unstructured data, we are going to focus on camera, does it have
handling structured data only in this book. some metadata
associated with it?
Unstructured data are sometimes described with
the help of some other data called metadata. Metadata
is basically data about data. For example, we describe
different parts of an email as subject, recipient, main
body, attachment, etc. These are the metadata for the
email data. Likewise, we can have some metadata for
an image file as image size (in KB or MB), image type
(for example, JPEG, PNG), image resolution, etc.

7.2 DATA COLLECTION

For processing data, we need to collect or gather data
first. We can then store the data in a file or database
for later use. Data collection here means identifying
already available data or collecting from the appropriate
sources. Suppose there are three different scenarios
where sales data in a grocery store are available:
• Sales data are available with the shopkeeper in a
diary or register. In this case we should enter the
data in a digital format for example, in a
spreadsheet.
• Data are already available in a digital format, say in
a CSV (comma separated values) file.
• The shopkeeper has so far not recorded any data in
either form but wants to get a software developed for
maintaining sales data and accounts. The software
may be developed using a programming language
such as Python which can be used to store and
retrieve data from a CSV file or a database
management system like MySQL, which will be
discussed further.
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 Data are continuously being generated at different
sources. Our interactions with digital medium are
continuously generating huge volumes of data. Hospitals
are collecting data about patients for improving their
services. Shopping malls are collecting data about the
items being purchased by people. On analysing such
data, suppose it appears that bedsheets and groceries
are frequently bought together. Hence, the shop owner
may decide to display bedsheets near the grocery section
Identify attributes in the mall to increase the sales. Likewise, a political
needed for analyst may look at the data contained in the posts and
creating an messages at a social media platform and analyse to see
Aadhaar Card. public opinion before an election. Organisations like
World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) are
collecting data related to various economic parameters
from different countries for making economic forecasts.

7.3 DATA STORAGE

Once we gather data and process them to get results, we
may not then simply discard the data. Rather, we
would like to store them for future use as well. Data
storage is the process of storing data on storage
devices so that data can be retrieved later. Now a days
large volume of data are being generated at a very high
rate. As a result, data storage has become a challenging
task. However, the decrease in the cost of digital
storage devices has helped in simplifying this task.
There are numerous digital storage devices available
in the market like, Hard Disk Drive (HDD), Solid State
Drive (SSD), CD/DVD, Tape Drive, Pen Drive, Memory
Card, etc.
We store data like images, documents, audios/
videos, etc. as files in our computers. Likewise, school/
Is it necessary to hospital data are stored in data files. We use computers
store data in files
before processing? to add, modify or delete data in these files or process
these data files to get results. However, file processing
has certain limitations, which can be overcome through
Database Management System (DBMS).

7.4 DATA PROCESSING

We are interested in understanding data as they hold
valuable facts and information that can be useful in
our decision making process. However, by looking at
the vast or large amount of data, one cannot arrive
at a conclusion. Rather, data need to be processed to

102
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get results and after
analysing those results, RAW DATA INFORMATION
Data Processing
we make conclusions or (Numbers/ (In the form
decisions. Text/Image) of table/
chart/text)
We find automated
data processing in
situations like online bill Data Process Cycle
payment, registration Input Processing Output
of complaints, booking
tickets, etc. Figure 7.1 Data Collection Store Reports
illustrates basic steps Data Prepration Retrieve Results
used to process the data Data Entry Classify Processing System
to get the output. Update

Figure 7.2 shows Figure 7.1: Steps in data processing

some tasks along with data, processing and generated
output/information.

7.5 STATISTICAL TECHNIQUES FOR DATA PROCESSING

Given a set of data values, we need to process them to get
information. There are various techniques which help
us to have preliminary understanding about the data.

AA wweebbssiittee hhaannddlliinngg oonnlliinnee fifilllliinngg ooff ssttuuddeenntt ddeettaaiillss ffoorr aa

ccoommppeettiittiivvee eexxaammiinnaattiioonn aanndd ggeenneerraattiinngg aaddmmiitt ccaarrdd

Student details like name, address,

Processing of filled in details for
qualification, marks, mobile
correctness of data received,
number, photo and sign, center
eligibility as per advertisement or Examination Admit card
choice, online fee payment details
not, fees paid or not, photo and specifying roll number, center
like credit/debit card, net banking
signature uploaded or not. Then, address, date and time of test.
or other mode of payment, etc.
generate a roll number and add this
applicant in the list of eligible
applicants.

AA BBaannkk hhaannddlliinngg wwiitthhddrraawwaallss ooff ccaasshh tthhrroouugghh AATTMMss

ooff iittss oowwnn bbrraanncchh

ATM PIN number, account type,

account number, card number, Checking for valid PIN number,
ATM location from where money existing bank balance, if satisfied, Currency notes, printed slip with
was withdrawn, date and time, and then deduction of amount from that transaction details
amount to be withdrawn. account and counting of rupees and
initiate printing of receipt

IIssssuuee ooff ttrraaiinn ttiicckkeett

Journey start and end stations, Verify login details and check
date of journey, number of tickets availability of berth in that class. If
required, class of travel payment done, issue tickets and Generate ticket with berth and
(Sleeper/AC/other), berth deduct that number from the total coach number, or issue ticket with
preference (if any), passenger available tickets on that coach. a waiting list number
name(s) and age(s), mobile and Allocate PNR number and berths or
email id, payment related details, generate a waiting number for that
etc. ticket.

Inputs against which

Problem Statement Processing Output
data are collected
UNDERSTANDING DATA Figure 7.2: Data based problem statements 103
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 NOTES Summarisation methods are applied on tabular data
for its easy comprehension. Commonly used statistical
techniques for data summarisation are given below:
7.5.1 Measures of Central Tendency
A measure of central tendency is a single value that
gives us some idea about the data. Three most
common measures of central tendency are the mean,
median, and mode. Instead of looking at each individual
data values, we can calculate the mean, median and
mode of the data to get an idea about average, middle
value and frequency of occurrence of a particular
value, respectively. Selection of a measure of central
tendency depends on certain characteristics of data.
(A) Mean
Mean is simply the average of numeric values of an
attribute. Mean is also called average. Suppose there
are data on weight of 40 students in a class. Instead
of looking at each of the data values, we can calculate
the average to get an idea about the average weight of
students in that class.
Definition: Given n values x1, x2, x3,...xn, mean is
n
computed as xi .
i

n
Example 7.1
Assume that height (in cm) of students in a class are as
follows [90,102,110,115,85,90,100,110,110]. Mean or
average height of the class is

Mean is not a suitable choice if there are outliers

in the data. To calculate mean, the outliers or extreme
values should be removed from the given data and then
calculate mean of the remaining data.
Note: An outlier is an exceptionally large or small value, in
comparison to other values of the data. Usually, outliers are
considered as error since they can influence/affect the average or
other statistical calculation based on the data.
(B) Median
Median is also computed for a single attribute/variable
at a time. When all the values are sorted in ascending or
descending order, the middle value is called the Median.
When there are odd number of values, then median is

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the value at the middle position. If the list has even
number of values, then median is the average of the two
middle values. Median represents the central value at
which the given data is equally divided into two parts.
Example 7.2
Consider the previous data of height of students used
in calculation of mean value. In order to compute the
median, the first step is to sort data in ascending or
descending order. We have sorted the height data in
ascending order as [85,90,90,100,102,110,110,110,
115]. As there are total 9 values (odd number), the
median is the value at position 5, that is 102 cm,
Out of Mean and
whether counted from left to right or from right to left. Median, which one
Median represents the actual central value at which is more sensitive to
the given data is equally divided into two parts. outliers in data?

(C) Mode
Value that appears most number of times in the given
data of an attribute/variable is called Mode. It is
computed on the basis of frequency of occurrence of
distinct values in the given data. A data set has no mode
if each value occurs only once. There may be multiple
modes in the data if more than one values have same
highest frequency. Mode can be found for numeric as
well as non-numeric data.
Example 7.3
In the list of height of students, mode is 110 as its
frequency of occurrence in the list is 3, which is larger
than the frequency of rest of the values.
7.5.2 Measures of Variability
The measures of variability refer to the spread or
variation of the values around the mean. They are also
called measures of dispersion that indicate the degree of
diversity in a data set. They also indicate difference within
the group. Two different data sets can have the same
mean, median or mode but completely different levels of
dispersion, or vice versa. Common measures of
dispersion or variability are Range and Standard
Deviation.
(A) Range
It is the difference between maximum and minimum
values of the data (the largest value minus the
smallest value). Range can be calculated only for
numerical data. It is a measure of dispersion and
tells about coverage/spread of data values. For

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 example difference in salaries of employees, marks of
a student, price of toys, etc. As range is calculated
based on the two extreme values, any outlier in the
data badly influences the result.
Let M be the largest or maximum value and S is the
smallest or minimum value in the data, then Range is
the difference between two extreme values i.e. M – S or
Maximum – Minimum.
Example 7.4
In the above example, minimum hight value is 85 cm
and maximum hight value is 115 cm. Hence, range is
115-85 = 30 cm.
(B) Standard deviation
Standard deviation refers to differences within the group
or set of data of a variable. Like Range, it also measures
the spread of data. However, unlike Range which only
uses two extreme values in the data, calculation of
standard deviation considers all the given data. It is
calculated as the positive square root of the average of
squared difference of each value from the mean value
of data. Smaller value of standard deviation means
data are less spread while a larger value of standard
deviation means data are more spread.
Given n values x1, x2, x3,...xn, and their mean x, the
standard deviation, represented as  (greek letter sigma)
is computed as
n
(X 2
i  X)
σ i1

Example 7.5
Let us compute the standard deviation of the height
of nine students that we used while calculating
Mean. The Mean (x) was calculated to be 101.33 cm.
Subtract each value from the mean and take square
of that value. Dividing the sum of square values by
total number of values and taking its square not
gives the standard deviation in data. See Table 7.3
for details.
Table 7.3 Standard deviation of attendance
_ of 9 students
(x _ )2
Height (x) in cm _
x_x x
90 -11.33 128.37 n
(Xi  X)2
102 0.67 0.36
 i1

110 8.67 75.17 n

115 13.67 186.87

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 85 -16.33 266.67
90 -11.33 128.37
n
100 -1.33 1.77 (Xi  X)
2

110 8.67 75.17 σ n i1

110 _8.67 _75.17

n=9 ∑(x- ) = 0.03 ∑(x-x)2 = 938.00
_ x
x =101.33

Let us look at the following problems and select

the suitable statistical technique to be applied (Mean/
Median/Mode/Range/Standard Deviation):
Choose suitable
Problem Statement
statistical method
The management of a company wants to know about disparity in salaries of
all employees.

Teacher wants to know about the average performance of the whole class in
a test.
Compare height of residents of two cities

Find the dominant value from a set of values

Compare income of residents of two cities

Find the popular color for car after surveying the car owners of a small city.

It is important to understand statistical techniques

so that one can decide which statistical technique to
use to arrive at a decision. Different programming tools
are available for efficient analysis of large volumes of
data. These tools make use of statistical techniques for
data analysis. One such programming tool is Python
and it has libraries specially built for data processing
and analysis. We will be covering some of them in the
following chapters.

SUMMARY
• Data refer to unorganised facts that can be
processed to generate meaningful result or
information.
• Data can be structured or unstructured.
• Hard Disk, SSD, CD/DVD, Pen Drive, Memory
Card, etc. are some of the commonly used
storage devices.

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 NOTES • Data Processing cycle involves input and storage
of data, its processing and generating output.
• Summarising data using statistical techniques
aids in revealing data characteristics.
• Mean, Median, Mode, Range, and Standard
Deviation are some of the statistical techniques
used for data summarisation.
• Mean is the average of given values.
• Median is the mid value when data are sorted in
ascending/descending order.
• Mode is the data value that appears most
number of times.
• Range is the difference between the maximum
and minimum values.
• Standard deviation is the positive square root of
the average of squared difference of each value
from the mean.

EXERCISE
1. Identify data required to be maintained to perform the
following services:
a) Declare exam results and print e-certificates
b) Register participants in an exhibition and issue
biometric ID cards
c) To search for an image by a search engine
d) To book an OPD appointment with a hospital in a
specific department
2. A school having 500 students wants to identify
beneficiaries of the merit-cum means scholarship,
achieving more than 75% for two consecutive years
and having family income less than 5 lakh per annum.
Briefly describe data processing steps to be taken by the
to beneficial prepare the list of school.
3. A bank ‘xyz’ wants to know about its popularity among
the residents of a city ‘ABC’ on the basis of number of
bank accounts each family has and the average monthly
account balance of each person. Briefly describe the
steps to be taken for collecting data and what results
can be checked through processing of the collected data.

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4. Identify type of data being collected/generated in the
following scenarios:
NOTES
a) Recording a video
b) Marking attendance by teacher
c) Writing tweets
d) Filling an application form online

5. Consider the temperature (in Celsius) of 7 days of a week

as 34, 34, 27, 28, 27, 34, 34. Identify the appropriate
statistical technique to be used to calculate the following:
a) Find the average temperature.
b) Find the temperature Range of that week.
c) Find the standard deviation temperature.
6. A school teacher wants to analyse results. Identify the
appropriate statistical technique to be used along with
its justification for the following cases:
a) Teacher wants to compare performance in terms of
division secured by students in Class XII A and Class
XII B where each class strength is same.
b) Teacher has conducted five unit tests for that class in
months July to November and wants to compare the
class performance in these five months.
7. Suppose annual day of your school is to be celebrated.
The school has decided to felicitate those parents of the
students studying in classes XI and XII, who are the
alumni of the same school. In this context, answer the
following questions:
a) Which statistical technique should be used to find
out the number of students whose both parents are
alumni of this school?
b) How varied are the age of parents of the students of
that school?
8. For the annual day celebrations, the teacher is looking
for an anchor in a class of 42 students. The teacher would
make selection of an anchor on the basis of singing
skill, writing skill, as well as monitoring skill.
a) Which mode of data collection should be used?
b) How would you represent the skill of students as
data?
9. Differentiate between structured and unstructured data
giving one example.
The principal of a school wants to do following analysis
on the basis of food items procured and sold in the
canteen:
a) Compare the purchase and sale price of fruit juice
and biscuits.

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 NOTES b) Compare sales of fruit juice, biscuits and samosa.
c) Variation in sale price of fruit juices of different
companies for same quantity (in ml).
Create an appropriate dataset for these items (fruit
juice, biscuits, samosa) by listing their purchase price
and sale price. Apply basic statistical techniques to
make the comparisons.

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 h a pter
C
8 Database
Concepts

“Inconsistency of your mind… Can

damage your memory… Remove the
inconsistent data… And keep the
original
one !!!”
— Nisarga Jain
In this Chapter
» Introduction
» File System
» Database Management
System 8.1 INTRODUCTION
» Rational Data Model
After learning about importance of data in the
» Keys in a Relational
Database
previous chapter, we need to explore the methods
to store and manage data electronically. Let us
take an example of a school that maintains data
about its students, along with their attendance
record and guardian details.
The class teacher marks daily attendance of the
students in the attendance register. The teacher
records ‘P’ for present or ‘A’ for absent against
each student’s roll number on each working day.
If class strength is 50 and total working days
in a month are 26, the teacher needs to record
50 × 26 records manually in the register every
month. As the volume of data increases, manual
data entry becomes tedious. Following are some
of the limitations of manual record keeping in
this example:
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 Activity 8.1 1) Entry of student details (Roll number and name)
in the new attendance register when the student is
Visit a few shops where
records are maintained promoted to the next class.
manually and identify 2) Writing student details on each month’s
a few limitations of
attendance page where inconsistency may happen
manual record
keeping faced by due to incorrectly written names, skipped student
them. records, etc.
3) Loss of data in case attendance register is lost
or damaged.
4) Erroneous calculation while consolidating
attendance record manually.
The office staff also manually maintain student details
viz. Roll Number, Name and Date of Birth with respective
guardian details viz. Guardian name, Contact Number
and Address. This is required for correspondence with
guardian regarding student attendance and result.
Finding information from a huge volume of papers
or deleting/modifying an entry is a difficult task in pen
and paper based approach. To overcome the hassles
faced in manual record keeping, it is desirable to store
attendance record and student details on separate data
files on a computerised system, so that office staff and
teachers can:
1) Simply copy the student details to the new
attendance file from the old attendance file when
students are promoted to next class.
2) Find any data about student or guardian.
3) Add more details to existing data whenever a new
student joins the school.
4) Modify stored data like details of student or guardian
whenever required.
5) Remove/delete data whenever a student leaves
the school.

8.2 FILE SYSTEM

A file can be understood as a container to store data in
a computer. Files can be stored on the storage device
of a computer system. Contents of a file can be texts,
computer program code, comma separated values
(CSV), etc. Likewise, pictures, audios/videos, web
pages are also files.
Files stored on a computer can be accessed directly
and searched for desired data. But to access data of a

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file through software, for example, to display monthly
attendance report on school website, one has to write
computer programs to access data from files.
Continuing the example of attendance at school,
we need to store data about students and attendance
in two separate files. Table 8.1 shows the contents of
STUDENT file which has six columns, as detailed
below:
RollNumber – Roll number of the student
SName – Name of the student
SDateofBirth – Date of birth of the student
GName – Name of the guardian
GPhone – Phone number of the student guardian
GAddress – Address of the guardian of the student
Table 8.1 STUDENT file maintained by office staff
Roll SDateof
SName GName GPhone GAddress
Number Birth
1 Atharv Ahuja 2003-05-15 Amit Ahuja 5711492685 G-35, Ashok Vihar,
Delhi
2 Daizy Bhutia 2002-02-28 Baichung 7110047139 Flat no. 5, Darjeeling
Bhutia Appt., Shimla
3 Taleem Shah 2002-02-28 Himanshu Shah 9818184855 26/77, West Patel
Nagar, Ahmedabad
4 John Dsouza 2003-08-18 Danny Dsouza S -13, Ashok Village,
Daman
5 Ali Shah 2003-07-05 Himanshu Shah 9818184855 26/77, West Patel
Nagar, Ahmedabad

6 Manika P. 2002-03-10 Sujata P. 7802983674 HNO-13, B- block, Preet

Vihar, Madurai

Table 8.2 shows another file called ATTENDANCE

which has four columns, as detailed below:
AttendanceDate – Date for which attendance was marked
RollNumber – Roll number of the student
SName – Name of the student
AttendanceStatus – Marked as P (present) or A
(absent)
Table 8.2 ATTENDANCE file maintained by class teacher
AttendanceDate RollNumber SName AttendanceStatus
2018-09-01 1 Atharv Ahuja P
2018-09-01 2 Daizy Bhutia P
2018-09-01 3 Taleem Shah A
2018-09-01 4 John Dsouza P

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 2018-09-01 5 Ali Shah A
2018-09-01 6 Manika P. P
2018-09-02 1 Atharv Ahuja P
2018-09-02 2 Daizy Bhutia P
2018-09-02 3 Taleem Shah A
2018-09-02 4 John Dsouza A
2018-09-02 5 Ali Shah P
2018-09-02 6 Manika P. P

8.2.1 Limitations of a File System

File system becomes difficult to handle when number of
files increases and volume of data also grows. Following
are some of the limitations of file system:
(A) Difficulty in Access
Files themselves do not provide any mechanism to
retrieve data. Data maintained in a file system are
accessed through application programs. While writing
such programs, the developer may not anticipate all
the possible ways in which data may be accessed. So,
sometimes it is difficult to access data in the required
format and one has to write application program to
access data.
(B) Data Redundancy
Redundancy means same data are duplicated in
different places (files). In our example, student names
are maintained in both the files. Besides, in Table
8.1, students with roll numbers 3 and 5 have same
guardian name and therefore same guardian name
is maintained twice. Both these are examples of
redundancy which is difficult to avoid in a file system.
Redundancy leads to excess storage use and may
cause data inconsistency also.
(C) Data Inconsistency
Data inconsistency occurs when same data maintained
in different places do not match. If a student wants to
get changed the spelling of her name, it needs to be
changed in SName column in both the files. Likewise, if
a student leaves school, the details need to be deleted
from both the files. As the files are being maintained by
different people, the changes may not happen in one of
the files. In that case, the student name will be
different (inconsistent) in both the files.
(D) Data Isolation

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Both the files presented at Table 8.1 (STUDENT) and at
Table 8.2 (ATTENDANCE) are related to students. But

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there is no link or mapping between them. The school
NOTES
will have to write separate programs to access these two
files. This is because data mapping is not supported in
file system. In a more complex system where data files
are generated by different person at different times, files
being created in isolation may be of different formats.
In such case, it is difficult to write new application
programs to retrieve data from different files maintained
at multiple places, as one has to understand the
underlying structure of each file as well.
(E) Data Dependence
Data are stored in a specific format or structure in a file.
If the structure or format itself is changed, all the existing
application programs accessing that file also need to
be changed. Otherwise, the programs may not work
correctly. This is data dependency. Hence, updating the
structure of a data file requires modification in all the
application programs accessing that file.
(F) Controlled Data Sharing
There can be different category of users like teacher,
office staff and parents. Ideally, not every user should
be able to access all the data. As an example, guardians
and office staff can only see the student attendance data
but should not be able to modify/delete it. It means
these users should be given limited access (read only)
to the ATTENDANCE file. Only the teacher should be
able to update the attendance data. It is very difficult to
enforce this kind of access control in a file system while
accessing files through application programs.

8.3 DATABASE MANAGEMENT SYSTEM

Limitations faced in file system can be overcome by
storing the data in a database where data are logically
related. We can organise related data in a database so
that it can be managed in an efficient and easy way.
A database management system (DBMS) or
database system in short, is a software that can be
used to create and manage databases. DBMS lets users
to create a database, store, manage, update/modify
and retrieve data from that database by users or
application programs. Some examples of open source
and commercial DBMS include MySQL, Oracle,
PostgreSQL, SQL Server, Microsoft Access, MongoDB.

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 A database system hides certain details about
how data are actually stored and maintained. Thus,
Some database it provides users with an abstract view of the data. A
management database system has a set of programs through which
systems include users or other programs can access, modify and
a graphical user
retrieve the stored data.
interface for users
to create and The DBMS serves as an interface between the
manage databases. database and end users or application programs.
Other database Retrieving data from a database through special type
systems use a
command of commands is called querying the database. In
line interface that addition, users can modify the structure of the
requires users to database itself through a DBMS.
use programming
Databases are widely used in various fields. Some
commands to
create and manage applications are given in Table 8.3.
databases.
Table 8.3 Use of Database in Real-life Applications
Application Database to maintain data about
Banking customer information, account details, loan details,
transaction details, etc.
Crop Loan kisan credit card data, farmer’s personal data, land
area and cultivation data, loan history, repayment
data, etc.
Inventory product details, customer information, order details,
Management delivery data, etc.
Organisation employee records, salary details, department
Resource information, branch locations, etc.
Management
Online items description, user login details, users
Shopping preferences details, etc.

8.3.1 File System to DBMS

Let us revisit our school example where two data files
were maintained (Table 8.1 by office and Table 8.2 by
teacher). Let us now design a database to store data of
those two files. We know that tables in a database are
linked or related through one or more common columns
or fields. In our example, the STUDENT (Table 8.1) file
and ATTENDANCE (Table 8.2) file have RollNumber
and SName as common field names. In order to convert
these two files into a database, we need to incorporate
the following changes:
a) SName need not be maintained in ATTENDANCE
file as it is already there in STUDENT. Details for a
student can be retrieved through the common field
RollNumber in both the files.

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 b) If two siblings are in the same class, then same
guardian details (GName, GPhone and GAddress)
are maintained for both the siblings. We know this
High Cost is incurred
is a redundancy and by using a database we can while shifting from
avoid this. So let us split the STUDENT file into two file system to DBMS:
file (STUDENT file and GUARDIAN) file so that • Purchasing
each guardian data are maintained only once. sophisticated
hardware and
c) One and more guardians can have the same name. software.
So it will not be possible to identify which guardian
• Training users for
is related to which student. In such case, we need querying.
to create an additional column, say GUID (Guardian
• Recurrent cost
ID) that will take unique value for each record in to take regular
the GUARDIAN file. The column GUID will also be backup and perform
kept with STUDENT file for relating these two files. recovery operations.

Note: We could distinguish guardians by their phone numbers

also. But, phone number can change, and therefore may not
truly distinguish guardian.
Figure 8.1 shows the related data files for the
STUDENT, GUARDIAN and ATTENDANCE details. Note
that this is not the complete database schema since it
does not show any relationship among tables.
STUDENT GUARDIAN ATTENDANCE
RollNumber SName GUID AttendanceDate
SDateofBirth GName RollNumber
GUID GPhone AttendanceStatus
GAddress

Figure 8.1: Record structure of three files in

STUDENTATTENDANCE database
The tables shown at Figure 8.1 are empty, which are
to be populated with actual data as shown in Table 8.4,
8.5 and 8.6.
Table 8.4 Snapshot of STUDENT table
RollNumber SName SDateofBirth GUID
1 Atharv Ahuja 2003-05-15 444444444444
2 Daizy Bhutia 2002-02-28 111111111111
3 Taleem Shah 2002-02-28
4 John Dsouza 2003-08-18 333333333333
5 Ali Shah 2003-07-05 101010101010
6 Manika P. 2002-03-10 466444444666

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 Table 8.5 Snapshot of GUARDIAN table
GUID GName GPhone GAddress
444444444444 Amit Ahuja 5711492685 G-35, Ashok Vihar, Delhi
111111111111 Baichung Bhutia 3612967082 Flat no. 5, Darjeeling Appt., Shimla
101010101010 Himanshu Shah 4726309212 26/77, West Patel Nagar, Ahmedabad
333333333333 Danny Dsouza S -13, Ashok Village, Daman
466444444666 Sujata P. 3801923168 HNO-13, B- block, Preet Vihar, Madurai
Table 8.6 Snapshot of ATTENDANCE table
Date RollNumber Status
2018-09-01 1 P
2018-09-01 2 P
2018-09-01 3 A
2018-09-01 4 P
2018-09-01 5 A
2018-09-01 6 P
2018-09-02 1 P
2018-09-02 2 P
2018-09-02 3 A
2018-09-02 4 A
2018-09-02 5 P
2018-09-02 6 P

Figure 8.2 shows a simplified database called

STUDENTATTENDANCE, which is used to maintain
data about the student, guardian and attendance. As
shown here, the DBMS maintains a single repository
of data at a centralised location and can be used by
multiple users (office staff, teacher) at the same time.

8.3.2 Key Concepts in DBMS

In order to efficiently manage data using a DBMS, let us
understand certain key terms:
(A) Database Schema
Database Schema is the design of a database. It is the
skeleton of the database that represents the structure
(table names and their fields/columns), the type of
data each column can hold, constraints on the data to
be stored (if any), and the relationships among the
tables. Database schema is also called the visual or
logical architecture as it tells us how the data are
organised in a database.

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 Teacher Office Staff

Query Query
Query Result

Query Result
DBMS Software processes Query
DBMS Software access database and its definition

Student
Database
Guardian Catalog

Attendance

Figure 8.2: STUDENTATTENDANCE database environment

(B) Data Constraint

Sometimes we put certain restrictions or limitations on
the type of data that can be inserted in one or more
columns of a table. This is done by specifying one or
more constraints on that column(s) while creating the
tables. For example, one can define the constraint that
the column mobile number can only have non-negative
integer values of exactly 10 digits. Since each student
shall have one unique roll number, we can put the NOT
NULL and UNIQUE constraints on the RollNumber
column. Constraints are used to ensure accuracy and
reliability of data in the database.
(C) Meta-data or Data Dictionary
The database schema along with various constraints
on the data is stored by DBMS in a database catalog or
dictionary, called meta-data. A meta-data is data about
the data.
(D) Database Instance
When we define database structure or schema, state
of database is empty i.e. no data entry is there. After
loading data, the state or snapshot of the database
at any given time is the database instance. We may
then retrieve data through queries or manipulate data

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 through updation, modification or deletion. Thus, the
state of database can change, and thus a database
schema can have many instances at different times.
(E) Query
A query is a request to a database for obtaining
information in a desired way. Query can be made to
get data from one table or from a combination of
tables. For example, “find names of all those students
present on Attendance Date 2000-01-02” is a query to
the database. To retrieve or manipulate data, the user
needs to write query using a query language called,
which is discussed in chapter 8.
Limitations of DBMS (F) Data Manipulation
Increased Complexity:
Use of DBMS
Modification of database consists of three operations
increases the viz. Insertion, Deletion or Update. Suppose, Rivaan
complexity of joins as a new student in the class then the student
maintaining details need to be added in STUDENT as well as in
functionalities like GUARDIAN files of the Student Attendance database.
security, consistency,
sharing and integrity
This is called Insertion operation on the database. In
case a student leaves the school, then his/her data as
Increased data well as her guardian details need to be removed from
vulnerability: STUDENT, GUARDIAN and ATTENDANCE files,
As data are stored
respectively. This is called Deletion operation on the
centrally, it increases
the chances of loss database. Suppose Atharv’s Guardian has changed his
of data due to any mobile number, his GPhone should be updated in
failure of hardware or GUARDIAN file. This is called Update operation on the
software. It can bring database.
all operations to a halt
for all the users. (G) Database Engine
Database engine is the underlying component or set of
programs used by a DBMS to create database and handle
various queries for data retrieval and manipulation.

8.4 RELATIONAL DATA MODEL

Different types of DBMS are available and their
classification is done based on the underlying data model.
A data model describes the structure of the database,
including how data are defined and represented,
relationships among data, and the constraints. The
most commonly used data model is Relational Data
Model. Other types of data models include object-
oriented data model, entity-relationship data model,
document model and hierarchical data model. This
book discusses the DBMS based on relational data
model.
In relational model, tables are called relations that
store data for different columns. Each table can have
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multiple columns where each column name should be
unique. For example, each row in the table represents
a related set of values. Each row of Table 8.5
represents a particular guardian and has related values
viz. guardian’s ID with guardian name, address and
phone number. Thus, a table consists of a collection of
relationships.
It is important to note here that relations in a
database are not independent tables, but are associated
with each other. For example, relation ATTENDANCE has
attribute RollNumber which links it with corresponding
student record in relation STUDENT. Similarly,
attribute GUID is placed with STUDENT table for
extracting guardian details of a particular student. If
linking attributes are not there in appropriate relations,
it will not be possible to keep the database in correct
state and retrieve valid information from the database.
Figure 8.3 shows the relational database Student
Attendance along with the three relations (tables)
STUDENT, ATTENDANCE and GUARDIAN.

Figure 8.3: Representing STUDENTATTENDANCE database using Relational Data Model

Table 8.7 Relation schemas along with its description of Student Attendance
database
Relation Scheme Description of attributes
STUDENT(RollNumber, RollNumber: unique id of the student
SName, SDateofBirth, SName: name of the student
GUID) SDateofBirth: date of birth of the student
GUID: unique id of the guardian of the student
ATTENDANCE AttendanceDate: date on which attendance is taken
(AttendanceDate, RollNumber: roll number of the student
RollNumber, AttendanceStatus: whether present (P) or absent(A)
AttendanceStatus) Note that combination of AttendanceDate and RollNumber will be unique
in each record of the table
GUARDIAN(GUID, GUID: unique id of the guardian
GName, GPhone, GName: name of the guardian
GAddress) GPhone: contact number of the guardian
GAddress: contact address of the guardian

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 Each tuple (row) in a relation (table) corresponds
to data of a real world entity (for example, Student,
Guardian, and Attendance). In the GUARDIAN relation
(Table 8.5), each row represents the facts about the
guardian and each column name in the GUARDIAN table
is used to interpret the meaning of data stored under that
column. A database that is modeled on relational data
model concept is called Relational Database. Figure 8.4
shows relation GUARDIAN with some populated data.
Let us now understand the commonly used
terminologies in relational data model using Figure 8.4.
Relation GUARDIAN
with 4 attribute/
columns

GUID GName GPhone GAddress

444444444444 Amit Ahuja 5711492685 G-35, Ashok Vihar, Delhi
111111111111 Baichung Bhutia 3612967082 Flat no. 5, Darjeeling Appt., Shimla

Relation
State
101010101010 Himanshu Shah 4726309212 26/77, West Patel Nagar, Ahmedabad
333333333333 Danny Dsouza S -13, Ashok Village, Daman
466444444666 Sujata P. 3801923168 HNO-13, B- block, Preet Vihar, Madurai

Facts about RELATION GUARDIAN:

1. Degree (Number of attributes) = 4 Record/tuple/row
2. Cardinality (Number of rows/tuples/records) = 5
3. Relation is a flat file i.e, each column has a single value and each record
has same number of columns
Figure 8.4: Relation GUARDIAN with its attributes and tuples

i) ATTRIBUTE: Characteristic or parameters for

which data are to be stored in a relation. Simply
stated, the columns of a relation are the attributes
which are also referred as fields. For example,
GUID, GName, GPhone and GAddress are attributes
of relation GUARDIAN.
ii) TUPLE: Each row of data in a relation (table) is
called a tuple. In a table with n columns, a tuple is
a relationship between the n related values.
iii) DOMAIN: It is a set of values from which an attribute
can take a value in each row. Usually, a data type is
used to specify domain for an attribute. For example,
in STUDENT relation, the attribute RollNumber
takes integer values and hence its domain is a set
of integer values. Similarly, the set of character
strings constitutes the domain of the attribute
SName.
iv) DEGREE: The number of attributes in a relation
is called the Degree of the relation. For example,
relation GUARDIAN with four attributes is a
relation of degree 4.

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 v) CARDINALITY: The number of tuples in a relation
is called the Cardinality of the relation. For
NOTES
example, the cardinality of relation GUARDIAN is 5
as there are 5 tuples in the table.
8.4.1 Three Important Properties of a Relation
In relational data model, following three properties are
observed with respect to a relation which makes a
relation different from a data file or a simple table.
Property 1: imposes following rules on an attribute of the
relation.
• Each attribute in a relation has a unique name.
• Sequence of attributes in a relation is immaterial.
Property 2: governs following rules on a tuple of a relation.
• Each tuple in a relation is distinct. For example, data
values in no two tuples of relation ATTENDANCE
can be identical for all the attributes. Thus, each
tuple of a relation must be uniquely identified by
its contents.
• Sequence of tuples in a relation is immaterial.
The tuples are not considered to be ordered, even
though they appear to be in tabular form.
Property 3: imposes following rules on the state of a
relation.
• All data values in an attribute must be from the
same domain (same data type).
• Each data value associated with an attribute
must be atomic (cannot be further divisible into
meaningful subparts). For example, GPhone of
relation GUARDIAN has ten digit numbers which
is indivisible.
• No attribute can have many data values in one
tuple. For example, Guardian cannot specify
multiple contact numbers under GPhone attribute.
• A special value “NULL” is used to represent
values that are unknown or non-applicable to
certain attributes. For example, if a guardian does
not share his or her contact number with the
school authorities, then GPhone is set to NULL
(data unknown).

8.5 KEYS IN A RELATIONAL DATABASE

The tuples within a relation must be distinct. It means no
two tuples in a table should have same value for all
attributes. That is, there should be at least one
attribute

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 NOTES in which data are distinct (unique) and not NULL. That
way, we can uniquely distinguish each tuple of a relation.
So, relational data model imposes some restrictions or
constraints on the values of the attributes and how the
contents of one relation be referred through another
relation. These restrictions are specified at the time of
defining the database through different types of keys as
given below:
8.5.1 Candidate Key
A relation can have one or more attributes that takes
distinct values. Any of these attributes can be used
to uniquely identify the tuples in the relation. Such
attributes are called candidate keys as each of them
are candidates for the primary key.
As shown in Figure 8.4, the relation GUARDIAN
has four attributes out of which GUID and GPhone
always take unique values. No two guardians will have
same phone number or same GUID. Hence, these two
attributes are the candidate keys as they both are
candidates for primary key.
8.5.2 Primary Key
Out of one or more candidate keys, the attribute chosen
by the database designer to uniquely identify the tuples
in a relation is called the primary key of that relation.
The remaining attributes in the list of candidate keys
are called the alternate keys.
In the relation GUARDIAN, suppose GUID is
chosen as primary key, then GPhone will be called the
alternate key.
8.5.3 Composite Primary Key
If no single attribute in a relation is able to uniquely
distinguish the tuples, then more than one attribute
are taken together as primary key. Such primary key
consisting of more than one attribute is called Composite
Primary key.
In relation ATTENDANCE, Roll Number cannot be
used as primary key as roll number of same student
will appear in another row for a different date. Similarly,
in relation Attendance, AttendanceDate cannot be
used as primary key because same date is repeated for
each roll number. However combination of these two
attributes RollNumber and AttendanceDate together
would always have unique value in ATTENDANCE
table as on any working day, of a student would be

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marked attendance only once. Hence {RollNumber,
AttendanceDate} will make the of ATTENDANCE relation
composite primary key.
8.5.4 Foreign Key
A foreign key is used to represent the relationship
between two relations. A foreign key is an attribute
whose value is derived from the primary key of another
relation. This means that any attribute of a relation
(referencing), which is used to refer contents from
another (referenced) relation, becomes foreign key if
it refers to the primary key of referenced relation. The
referencing relation is called Foreign Relation. In some
cases, foreign key can take NULL value if it is not the
part of primary key of the foreign table. The relation in
which the referenced primary key is defined is called
primary relation or master relation.
In Figure 8.5, two foreign keys in Student Attendance
database are shown using schema diagram where
the foreign key is displayed as a directed arc (arrow)
originating from it and ending at the corresponding
attribute of the primary key of the referenced table. The
underlined attributes make the primary key of that table.

STUDENT RollNumber SName SDateofBirth GUID

GUARDIAN GUID GName GPhone GAddress

ATTENDANCE AttendanceDate RollNumber AttendanceStatus

Figure 8.5: STUDENTATTENDANCE database with the primary and foreign keys

SUMMARY
• A file in a file system is a container to store data in a computer.
• File system suffers from Data Redundancy, Data Inconsistency, Data
Isolation, Data Dependence and Controlled Data sharing.
• Database Management System (DBMS) is a software to create and
manage databases. A database is a collection of tables.
• Database schema is the design of a database.
• A database constraint is a restriction on the type of data that that can be
inserted into the table.

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 • Database schema and database constraints are stored in database catalog.
• The snapshot of the database at any given time is the database instance.
• A query is a request to a database for information retrieval and data
manipulation (insertion, deletion or update). It is written in Structured
Query Language (SQL).
• Relational DBMS (RDBMS) is used to store data in related tables. Rows
and columns of a table are called tuples and attributed respectively. A
table is referred to as a relation.
• Destructions on data stored in a RDBMS is applied by use of keys such as
Candidate Key, Primary Key, Composite Primary Key, Foreign Key.
• Primary key in a relation is used for unique identification of tuples.
• Foreign key is used to relate two tables or relations.
• Each column in a table represents a feature (attribute) of a record. Table
stores the information for an entity whereas a row represents a record.
• Each row in a table represents a record. A tuple is a collection of attribute
values that makes a record unique.
• A tuple is a unique entity whereas attribute values can be duplicate in
the table.
• SQL is the standard language for RDBMS systems like MySQL.

EXERCISE
1. Give the terms for each of the following:
a) Collection of logically related records.
b) DBMS creates a file that contains description about
the data stored in the database.
c) Attribute that can uniquely identify the tuples in
a relation.
d) Special value that is stored when actual data value is
unknown for an attribute.
e) An attribute which can uniquely identify tuples of the
table but is not defined as primary key of the table.
f) Software that is used to create, manipulate and
maintain a relational database.
2. Why foreign keys are allowed to have NULL values?
Explain with an example.
3. Differentiate between:
a) Database state and database schema
b) Primary key and foreign key
c) Degree and cardinality of a relation

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4. Compared to a file system, how does a database
management system avoid redundancy in data through
NOTES
a database?
5. What are the limitations of file system that can be
overcome by a relational DBMS?
6. A school has a rule that each student must participate
in a sports activity. So each one should give only one
preference for sports activity. Suppose there are five
students in a class, each having a unique roll number.
The class representative has prepared a list of sports
preferences as shown below. Answer the following:
Table: Sports Preferences
Roll_no Preference
9 Cricket
13 Football
17 Badminton
17 Football
21 Hockey
24 NULL
NULL Kabaddi
a) Roll no 24 may not be interested in sports. Can
a NULL value be assigned to that student’s
preference field?
b) Roll no 17 has given two preferences in sports. Which
property of relational DBMC is violated here? Can we
use any constraint or key in the relational DBMS to
check against such violation, if any?
c) Kabaddi was not chosen by any student. Is it possible
to have this tuple in the Sports Preferences relation?
7. In another class having 2 sections, the two respective
class representatives have prepared 2 separate Sports
Preferences tables, as shown below:
Sports preference of section 1 (arranged on roll number
column)
Table: Sports Preferences
Roll_no Sports
9 Cricket
13 Football
17 Badminton
21 Hockey
24 Cricket
Sports preference of section 2 (arranged on Sports name
column, and column order is also different)

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 NOTES Table: Sports Preferences
Sports Roll_no
Badminton 17
Cricket 9
Cricket 24
Football 13
Hockey 21
Are the states of both the relations equivalent? Justify.
8. The school canteen wants to maintain records of items
available in the school canteen and generate bills when
students purchase any item from the canteen. The
school wants to create a canteen database to keep track
of items in the canteen and the items purchased by
students. Design a database by answering the following
questions:
a) To store each item name along with its price, what
relation should be used? Decide appropriate attribute
names along with their data type. Each item and its
price should be stored only once. What restriction
should be used while defining the relation?
b) In order to generate bill, we should know the quantity
of an item purchased. Should this information be in
a new relation or a part of the previous relation? If
a new relation is required, decide appropriate name
and data type for attributes. Also, identify appropriate
primary key and foreign key so that the following two
restrictions are satisfied:
i) The same bill cannot be generated for different
orders.
ii) Bill can be generated only for available items in
the canteen.
c) The school wants to find out how many calories
students intake when they order an item. In which
relation should the attribute ‘calories’ be stored?

9. An organisation wants to create a database EMP-

DEPENDENT to maintain following details about its
employees and their dependent.
EMPLOYEE(AadharNumber, Name, Address,
Department,EmployeeID)
DEPENDENT(EmployeeID, DependentName, Relationship)
a) Name the attributes of EMPLOYEE, which can be
used as candidate keys.
b) The company wants to retrieve details of dependent
of a particular employee. Name the tables and the key
which are required to retrieve this detail.

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 c) What is the degree of EMPLOYEE and DEPENDENT
relation?
10. School uniform is available at M/s Sheetal Private
Limited. They have maintained SCHOOL_UNIFORM
Database with two relations viz. UNIFORM and COST.
The following figure shows database schema and its
state.
School Uniform Database

Attributes and Constraints

Table: COST
UCode Size COST Price
Table: UNIFORM 1 M 500
Attribute UCode UName UColor 1 L 580
Constraints Primary Key Not Null - 1 XL 620
2 M 810
Table: COST 2 L 890
Attribute UCode Size Price 2 XL 940
Constraints Composite Primary Key >0 3 M 770
3 L 830
3 XL 910
Table: UNIFORM
4 S 150
UCode UName UColor 4 L 170
1 Shirt White 5 S 180
2 Pant Grey 5 L 210
3 Skirt Grey 6 M 110
4 Tie Blue 6 L 140
5 Socks Blue 6 XL 160
6 Belt Blue

a) Can they insert the following tuples to the UNIFORM

Relation? Give reasons in support of your answer.
i) 7, Handkerchief, NULL
ii) 4, Ribbon, Red
iii) 8, NULL, White
b) Can they insert the following tuples to the COST
Relation? Give reasons in support of your answer.
i) 7, S, 0
ii) 9, XL, 100
11. In a multiplex, movies are screened in different
auditoriums. One movie can be shown in more than one
auditorium. In order to maintain the record of movies,
the multiplex maintains a relational database
consisting of two relations viz. MOVIE and AUDI
respectively as shown below:
Movie(Movie_ID, MovieName, ReleaseDate)
Audi(AudiNo, Movie_ID, Seats, ScreenType, TicketPrice)

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 a) Is it correct to assign Movie_ID as the primary
key in the MOVIE relation? If no, then suggest an
appropriate primary key.
b) Is it correct to assign AudiNo as the primary key in
the AUDI relation? If no, then suggest appropriate
primary key.
c) Is there any foreign key in any of these relations?

Student Project Database

Table: STUDENT
Roll No Name Class Section Registration_ID
11 Mohan XI 1 IP-101-15
12 Sohan XI 2 IP-104-15
21 John XII 1 CS-103-14
Table: PROJECT ASSIGNED
22 Meena XII 2 CS-101-14
Registration_ID ProjectNo
23 Juhi XII 2 CS-101-10
IP-101-15 101
Table: PROJECT IP-104-15 103
ProjectNo PName SubmissionDate CS-103-14 102
101 Airline Database 12/01/2018 CS-101-14 105
102 Library Database 12/01/2018 CS-101-10 104
103 Employee Database 15/01/2018
104 Student Database 12/01/2018
105 Inventory Database 15/01/2018
106 Railway Database 15/01/2018

12. For the above given database STUDENT-PROJECT,

answer the following:
a) Name primary key of each table.
b) Find foreign key(s) in table PROJECT-ASSIGNED.
c) Is there any alternate key in table STUDENT? Give
justification for your answer.
d) Can a user assign duplicate value to the field RollNo
of STUDENT table? Jusify.

13. For the above given database STUDENT-PROJECT, can

we perform the following operations?
a) Insert a student record with missing roll number
value.
b) Insert a student record with missing registration
number value.
c) Insert a project detail without submission-date.
d) Insert a record with registration ID IP-101-19 and
ProjectNo 206 in table PROJECT-ASSIGNED.

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 h a pter
C
Structured
9 Query
Language (SQL)

“Any unique image that you desire

probably already exists on the internet or
in some database... The problem today is no
longer how to create the right image, but how
to find an already existing one. ”
— Lev Manovich

In this Chapter
» Introduction
» Structured Query Language
(SQL)
9.1 INTRODUCTION
» Data Types and
Constraints in MySQL We have learnt about Relational Database
» SQL for Data Definition Management Systems (RDBMS) and its purpose
in the previous chapter. There are many
» SQL for Data
Manipulation
RDBMS such as MySQL, Microsoft SQL Server,
PostgreSQL, Oracle, etc. that allow us to create
» SQL for Data Query a database consisting of relations. These RDBMS
» Data Updation and also allow us to store, retrieve and manipulate
Deletion data on that database through queries. In this
» Functions in SQL chapter, we will learn how to create, populate
» GROUP BY Clause in SQL and query databases using MySQL.
» Operations on Relations
9.2 STRUCTURED QUERY LANGUAGE (SQL)
» Using Two Relations in a
Query One has to write application programs to access
data in case of a file system. However, for database
management systems there are special kinds of
languages called query language that can be used
to access and manipulate data from the database.
The Structured Query Language (SQL) is the
most popular query language used by major
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relational

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 database management systems such as MySQL,
ORACLE, SQL Server, etc.
Activity 9.1 SQL is easy to learn as the statements comprise of
descriptive English words and are not case sensitive.
Find and list other
types of databases We can create and interact with a database using SQL
other than easily. Benefit of using SQL is that we do not have to
RDBMS. specify how to get the data from the database. Rather,
we simply specify what is to be retrieved, and SQL
does the rest. Although called a query language, SQL
can do much more, besides querying. SQL provides
statements for defining the structure of the data,
manipulating data in the database, declaring
constraints and retrieving data from the database in
various ways, depending on our requirements.
In this chapter, we will use the StudentAttendance
discussed in chapter 8 and create a database. We
will also learn how to populate databases with data,
manipulate data and retrieve data from a database
through SQL queries.
9.2.1 Installing MySQL
MySQL is an open source RDBMS software which can
be easily downloaded from the official website https://
dev.mysql.com/downloads. After installing MySQL,
start MySQL service. The appearance of mysql>
prompt (Figure 9.1) means that MySQL is ready to
accept SQL statements.

Figure 9.1: MySQL Shell

Following are some important points to be kept in

mind while using SQL:

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• SQL is case insensitive. For example, the column
names ‘salary’ and ‘SALARY’ are the same for SQL.
• Always end SQL statements with a semicolon (;).
• To enter multiline SQL statements, we don’t write
“;” after the first line. We press the Enter key to
continue on the next line. The prompt mysql> then
changes to “->”, indicating that statement is
continued to the next line. After the last line, put “;”
and press enter.

9.3 DATA TYPES AND CONSTRAINTS IN MYSQL

We know that a database consists of one or more
relations and each relation (table) is made up of
attributes (column). Each attribute has a data type. We
can also specify constraints for each attribute of a
relation. Activity 9.2

9.3.1 Data type of Attribute What are the other

data types supported
Data type of an attribute indicates the type of data in MySQL? Are there
value that an attribute can have. It also decides the other variants of
operations that can be performed on the data of that integer and float
data type?
attribute. For example, arithmetic operations can be
performed on numeric data but not on character data.
Commonly used data types in MySQL are numeric
types, date and time types, and string types as shown
in Table 9.1.

Table 9.1 Commonly used data types in MySQL

Data type Description
CHAR(n) Specifies character type data of length n where n could be any value from 0 to
255. CHAR is of fixed length, means, declaring CHAR (10) implies to reserve
spaces for 10 characters. If data does not have 10 characters (e.g., ‘city’ has
four characters), MySQL fills the remaining 6 characters with spaces padded
on the right.
VARCHAR(n) Specifies character type data of length where n could be any value from 0 to
65535. But unlike CHAR, VARCHAR(n) is a variable-length data type. That is,
declaring VARCHAR (30) means a maximum of 30 characters can be stored but
the actual allocated bytes will depend on the length of entered string. So ‘city’
in VARCHAR (30) will occupy space needed to store 4 characters only.
INT INT specifies an integer value. Each INT value occupies 4 bytes of storage. The
range of unsigned values allowed in a 4 byte integer type are 0 to 4,294,967,295.
For values larger than that, we have to use BIGINT, which occupies 8 bytes.
FLOAT Holds numbers with decimal points. Each FLOAT value occupies 4 bytes.
DATE The DATE type is used for dates in 'YYYY-MM-DD' format. YYYY is the 4 digit
year, MM is the 2 digit month and DD is the 2 digit date. The supported range
is '1000-01-01' to '9999-12-31'.

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 9.3.2 Constraints
Which two Constraints are the certain types of restrictions on the
constraints when
data values that an attribute can have. Table 9.2 lists
applied together will
produce a Primary some of the commonly used constraints in SQL. They
Key constraint? are used to ensure correctness of data. However, it is
not mandatory to define constraints for each attribute
of a table.
Table 9.2 Commonly used SQL Constraints
Constraint Description
NOT NULL Ensures that a column cannot have NULL values where NULL means missing/
unknown/not applicable value.
UNIQUE Ensures that all the values in a column are distinct/unique
DEFAULT A default value specified for the column if no value is provided
PRIMARY KEY The column which can uniquely identify each row/record in a table.
FOREIGN KEY The column which refers to value of an attribute defined as primary key in another
table

9.4 SQL FOR DATA DEFINITION

In order to be able to store data we need to first define
the relation schema. Defining a schema includes creating
a relation and giving name to a relation, identifying the
attributes in a relation, deciding upon the datatype for
each attribute and also specify the constraints as per
the requirements. Sometimes, we may require to make
changes to the relation schema also. SQL allows us to
write statements for defining, modifying and deleting
relation schemas. These are part of Data Definition
Language (DDL).
We have already learned that the data are stored in
relations or tables in a database. Hence, we can say
that a database is a collection of tables. The Create
statement is used to create a database and its tables
(relations). Before creating a database, we should be
clear about the number of tables the database will
have, the columns (attributes) in each table along with
the data type of each column, and its constraint, if any.
9.4.1 CREATE Database
To create a database, we use the CREATE DATABASE
statement as shown in the following syntax:
CREATE DATABASE databasename;
To create a database called StudentAttendance, we
will type following command at mysql prompt.

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 mysql> CREATE DATABASE StudentAttendance;
Query OK, 1 row affected (0.02 sec)
Note: In LINUX environment, names for database and tables
are case-sensitive whereas in WINDOWS, there is no such
differentiation. However, as a good practice, it is suggested to write
database/table name in the same letter cases that were used at the
time of their creation.
A DBMS can manage multiple databases on one
computer. Therefore, we need to select the database
Activity 9.3
that we want to use. To know the names of existing
databases, we use the statement SHOW DATABASES. Type the statement
From the listed databases, we can select the database show database; Does
it show the name of
to be used. Once the database is selected, we can StudentAttendance
proceed with creating tables or querying data. database?
In order to use the StudentAttendance database, the
following SQL statement is required.
mysql> USE StudentAttendance; Database
changed
Initially, the created database is empty. It can be
checked by using the show tables statement that lists
names of all the tables within a database.
mysql> SHOW TABLES;
Empty set (0.06 sec)

9.4.2 CREATE Table

After creating a database StudentAttendance, we need to
define relations in this database and specify attributes
for each relation along with data type and constraint
(if any) for each attribute. This is done using the
CREATE TABLE statement.
Syntax:
CREATE TABLE tablename( attributename1
datatype constraint, attributename2
datatype constraint,
:
attributenameN datatype constraint);
It is important to observe the following points with
respect to the CREATE TABLE statement:
• The number of columns in a table defines the
degree of that relation, which is denoted by N.
• Attribute name specifies the name of the column in
the table.
• Datatype specifies the type of data that an attribute
can hold.

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 • Constraint indicates the restrictions imposed on the
values of an attribute. By default, each attribute can
take NULL values except for the primary key.
Let us identify data types of the attributes of table
STUDENT along with their constraints (if any). Assuming
maximum students in a class to be 100 and values of
roll number in a sequence from 1 to 100, we know that
3 digits are sufficient to store values for the attribute
RollNumber. Hence, data type INT is appropriate for this
attribute. Total number of characters in a student
name (SName) can differ. Assuming maximum
characters in a name as 20, we use VARCHAR(20) for
the SName column. Data type for the attribute
SDateofBirth is DATE and supposing the school uses
guardian’s 12 digit Aadhaar number as GUID, we can
declare GUID as CHAR (12) since Aadhaar number is of
fixed length and we are not going to perform any
mathematical operation on GUID.
Table 9.3, 9.4 and 9.5 shows the chosen data type
and constraint for each attribute of the relations
STUDENT, GUARDIAN and ATTENDANCE, respectively.
Table 9.3 Data types and constraints for the attributes of relation STUDENT
Attribute Name Data expected to be stored Data type Constraint
RollNumber Numeric value consisting of maximum 3 digits INT PRIMARY KEY
SName Variant length string of maximum 20 characters VARCHAR(20) NOT NULL
SDateofBirth Date value DATE NOT NULL
GUID Numeric value consisting of 12 digits CHAR (12) FOREIGN KEY

Table 9.4 Data types and constraints for the attributes of relation GUARDIAN
Attribute Name Data expected to be stored Data type Constraint
GUID Numeric value consisting of 12 digit Aadhaar CHAR (12) PRIMARY KEY
number
GName Variant length string of maximum 20 VARCHAR(20) NOT NULL
characters
GPhone Numeric value consisting of 10 digits CHAR(10) NULL UNIQUE
GAddress Variant length String of size 30 characters VARCHAR(30) NOT NULL

Table 9.5 Data types and constraints for the attributes of relation ATTENDANCE.
Attribute Name Data expected to be stored Data type Constraint
AttendanceDate Date value DATE PRIMARY KEY*
RollNumber Numeric value consisting of maximum 3 INT PRIMARY KEY*
digits FOREIGN KEY
AttendanceStatus ‘P’ for present and ‘A’ for absent CHAR(1) NOT NULL
*means part of composite primary key.

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 Once data types and constraints are identified, let
us create tables without specifying constraints along Which datatype out
with the attribute name for simplification. We will of Char and Varchar
will you prefer for
learn to incorporate constraints on attributes in
storing contact
Section 9.4.4. number(mobile
number)? Discuss.
Example 9.1 Create table STUDENT.
mysql> CREATE TABLE STUDENT(
-> RollNumber INT,
-> SName VARCHAR(20),
-> SDateofBirth DATE,
-> GUID CHAR (12),
-> PRIMARY KEY (RollNumber)); Query
OK, 0 rows affected (0.91 sec)
Note: “,” is used to separate two attributes and each statement
terminates with a semi-colon (;). The arrow (->) is an interactive
continuation prompt. If we enter an unfinished statement, the SQL
shell will wait for us to enter the rest of the statement.

9.4.3 Describe Table

We can view the structure of an already created table
using the DESCRIBE statement or DESC statement.
Syntax:
DESCRIBE tablename;
mysql> DESCRIBE STUDENT;
+--------------+-------------+------+-----+---------+---------------------------------------+
| Field | Type | Null | Key | Default | Extra |
+--------------+-------------+------+-----+---------+---------------------------------------+
| RollNumber | int | NO | PRI | NULL | |
| SName | varchar(20) | YES | | NULL | |
| SDateofBirth | date | YES | | NULL | |
| GUID | char(12) | YES | | NULL | |
+--------------+-------------+------+-----+---------+---------------------------------------+

4 rows in set (0.06 sec)

We can use the SHOW TABLES statement to see the
tables in the StudentAttendance database. So far, we Activity 9.4
have only the STUDENT table.
Create the other two
mysql> SHOW TABLES; relations GUARDIAN
+-------------------------------------------------+ and ATTENDANCE as
| Tables_in_studentattendance | per data types given
+-------------------------------------------------+ in Table 9.4 and 9.5
| student | respectively, and
view their structures.
Do not add any
+-------------------------------------------------+ constraint in
1 row in set (0.00 sec) these two
tables.
9.4.4 ALTER Table
After creating a table, we may realise that we need to
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add/remove an attribute or to modify the datatype of
an existing attribute or to add constraint in attribute. In

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 all such cases, we need to change or alter the structure
(schema) of the table by using the alter statement.
(A) Add primary key to a relation
Let us now alter the tables created in Activity 9.4. The
following MySQL statement adds a primary key to the
GUARDIAN relation:
mysql> ALTER TABLE GUARDIAN ADD PRIMARY KEY (GUID);
Query OK, 0 rows affected (1.14 sec)
Records: 0 Duplicates: 0 Warnings: 0
Now let us add the primary key to the
ATTENDANCE relation. The primary key of this
relation is a composite key made up of two attributes -
AttendanceDate and RollNumber.
mysql> ALTER TABLE ATTENDANCE
-> ADD PRIMARY KEY(AttendanceDate, RollNumber);
Query OK, 0 rows affected (0.52 sec)
Activity 9.5 Records: 0 Duplicates: 0 Warnings: 0

Add foreign key in the (B) Add foreign key to a relation

ATTENDANCE table Once primary keys are added, the next step is to add
(use Figure 9.1) to foreign keys to the relation (if any). Following points
identify referencing need to be observed while adding foreign key to a
and referenced
relation:
tables).
• The referenced relation must be already created.
• The referenced attribute(s) must be part of the
primary key of the referenced relation.
• Data types and size of referenced and referencing
attributes must be the same.
Syntax:
ALTER TABLE table_name ADD FOREIGN KEY(attribute
name) REFERENCES referenced_table_name
(attribute name);
Let us now add foreign key to the table STUDENT.
Table 9.3 shows that attribute GUID (the referencing
Name foreign keys
in table attribute) is a foreign key and it refers to attribute GUID
ATTENDANCE and (the referenced attribute) of table GUARDIAN. Hence,
STUDENT. Is there STUDENT is the referencing table and GUARDIAN is the
any foreign key in referenced table as shown in Figure 8.4 in the previous
table GUARDIAN. chapter.
mysql> ALTER TABLE STUDENT
-> ADD FOREIGN KEY(GUID) REFERENCES
-> GUARDIAN(GUID);
Query OK, 0 rows affected (0.75 sec)
Records: 0 Duplicates: 0 Warnings: 0

(C) Add constraint UNIQUE to an existing attribute

In GUARDIAN table, the attribute GPhone has a
constraint UNIQUE which means no two values in that
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 Syntax:
ALTER TABLE table_name ADD UNIQUE (attribute name);
NOTES
Let us now add the constraint UNIQUE with the
attribute GPhone of the table GUARDIAN as shown at
table 9.4.
mysql> ALTER TABLE GUARDIAN
-> ADD UNIQUE(GPhone);
Query OK, 0 rows affected (0.44 sec)
Records: 0 Duplicates: 0 Warnings: 0
(D) Add an attribute to an existing table
Sometimes, we may need to add an additional
attribute in a table. It can be done using the ADD
attribute statement as shown in the following Syntax:
ALTER TABLE table_name ADD attribute name
DATATYPE;
Suppose, the principal of the school has decided to
award scholarship to some needy students for which
income of the guardian must be known. But, the school
has not maintained the income attribute with table
GUARDIAN so far. Therefore, the database designer
now needs to add a new attribute Income of data type
INT in the table GUARDIAN.
mysql> ALTER TABLE GUARDIAN
-> ADD income INT;
Query OK, 0 rows affected (0.47 sec)
Records: 0 Duplicates: 0 Warnings: 0
(E) Modify datatype of an attribute
We can change data types of the existing attributes of a
table using the following ALTER statement.
Syntax:
ALTER TABLE table_name MODIFY attribute DATATYPE;
Suppose we need to change the size of the attribute
GAddress from VARCHAR(30) to VARCHAR(40) of the
GUARDIAN table. The MySQL statement will be:
mysql> ALTER TABLE GUARDIAN
-> MODIFY GAddress VARCHAR(40);
Query OK, 0 rows affected (0.11 sec)
Records: 0 Duplicates: 0 Warnings: 0
(F) Modify constraint of an attribute
When we create a table, by default each attribute takes
NULL value except for the attribute defined as primary
key. We can change an attribute’s constraint from
NULL to NOT NULL using an alter statement.

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 Syntax:
ALTER TABLE table_name MODIFY attribute DATATYPE NOT
What are the NULL;
minimum and Note: We have to specify the data type of the attribute along with
maximum income constraint NOT NULL while using MODIFY.
values that can be
entered in the To associate NOT NULL constraint with attribute
income attribute SName of table STUDENT (table 9.3), we write the
given the data type is following MySQL statement:
INT?
mysql> ALTER TABLE STUDENT
-> MODIFY SName VARCHAR(20) NOT NULL;
Query OK, 0 rows affected (0.47 sec)
Records: 0 Duplicates: 0 Warnings: 0
(G) Add default value to an attribute
If we want to specify default value for an attribute,
then use the following syntax:
ALTER TABLE table_name MODIFY attribute DATATYPE
DEFAULT default_value;

To set default value of SDateofBirth of STUDENT to

15th May 2000, write the following statement:
mysql> ALTER TABLE STUDENT
-> MODIFY SDateofBirth DATE DEFAULT ‘2000-05- 15’;
Query OK, 0 rows affected (0.08 sec)
Records: 0 Duplicates: 0 Warnings: 0
Note: We have to specify the data type of the attribute along with
DEFAULT while using MODIFY.
(H) Remove an attribute
Using ALTER, we can remove attributes from a table,
as shown in the following syntax:
ALTER TABLE table_name DROP attribute;
To remove the attribute income from table GUARDIAN
(Table 9.4), write the following MySQL statement:
mysql> ALTER TABLE GUARDIAN DROP income;
Query OK, 0 rows affected (0.42 sec)
Records: 0 Duplicates: 0 Warnings: 0
(I) Remove primary key from the table
Sometime there may be a requirement to remove
primary key constraint from the table. In that case, Alter
table command can be used in the following way:
Syntax:
ALTER TABLE table_name DROP PRIMARY KEY;
To remove primary key of table GUARDIAN (Figure
9.4), write the following MySQL statement:
mysql> ALTER TABLE GUARDIAN DROP PRIMARY KEY;
Query OK, 0 rows affected (0.72 sec)
Records: 0 Duplicates: 0 Warnings: 0

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Note: We have dropped the primary key from the GUARDIAN
table, but each table should have a primary key to maintain NOTES
uniqueness. Hence, we have to use the ADD statement with the
Alter Table command to specify the primary key for the
GUARDIAN table as shown in earlier examples.

9.4.5 DROP Statement

Sometimes a table in a database or the database itself
needs to be removed. We can use a DROP statement
to remove a database or a table permanently from the
system. However, one should be very cautious while
using this statement as it cannot be undone.
Syntax to drop a table:
DROP TABLE table_name;
Syntax to drop a database:
DROP DATABASE database_name;
Note: Using the DROP statement to remove a database will
ultimately remove all the tables within it.

9.5 SQL FOR DATA MANIPULATION

In the previous section, we created the database
StudentAttendance having three relations STUDENT,
GUARDIAN and ATTENDANCE. When we create a
table, only its structure is created but the table has no
data. To populate records in the table, INSERT
statement is used. Also, table records can be deleted or
updated using DELETE and UPDATE statements. These
SQL statements are part of Data Manipulation
Language (DML).
Data Manipulation using a database means either
insertion of new data, removal of existing data or
modification of existing data in the database
9.5.1 INSERTION of Records
INSERT INTO statement is used to insert new records in
a table. Its syntax is:
INSERT INTO tablename
VALUES(value 1, value 2,.............);
Here, value 1 corresponds to attribute 1, value 2
corresponds to attribute 2 and so on. Note that we need
not to specify attribute names in the insert statement
if there are exactly the same numbers of values in the
INSERT statement as the total number of attributes in
the table.
Caution: While populating records in a table with foreign
key, ensure that records in referenced tables are already
populated.
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 Let us insert some records in the
StudentAttendance database. We shall insert records
in the GUARDIAN table first as it does not have any
foreign key. A set of sample records for GUARDIAN
table is shown in the given table (Table 9.6).
Table 9.6 GUARDIAN Table
GUID GName GPhone GAddress
444444444444 Amit Ahuja 5711492685 G-35, Ashok Vihar, Delhi
111111111111 Baichung Bhutia 3612967082 Flat no. 5, Darjeeling Appt., Shimla
101010101010 Himanshu Shah 4726309212 26/77, West Patel Nagar, Ahmedabad
333333333333 Danny Dsouza S -13, Ashok Village, Daman
466444444666 Sujata P. 3801923168 HNO-13, B- block, Preet Vihar, Madurai

The following insert statement adds the first record

in the table:
mysql> INSERT INTO GUARDIAN
-> VALUES (444444444444, 'Amit Ahuja',
-> 5711492685, 'G-35,Ashok vihar, Delhi' ); Query OK, 1
row affected (0.01 sec)
We can use the SQL statement SELECT * from
table_name to view the inserted records. The SELECT
statement will be explained in the next section.
mysql> SELECT * from GUARDIAN;
+--------------+---------------+------------+----------------------------------------------------------------------+
| GUID | GName | Gphone | GAddress |
+--------------+---------------+------------+----------------------------------------------------------------------+
| 444444444444 | Amit Ahuja | 5711492685 | G-35, Ashok vihar, Delhi |
+--------------+---------------+------------+----------------------------------------------------------------------+
1 row in set (0.00 sec)

If we want to insert values only for some of the

attributes in a table (supposing other attributes having
NULL or any other default value), then we shall specify
Activity 9.6
the attribute names in which the values are to be inserted
using the following syntax of INSERT INTO statement.
Write SQL statements
to insert the remaining Syntax:
3 rows of table INSERT INTO tablename (column1, column2,.............)
9.6 in table VALUES (value1, value2,..............);
GUARDIAN.
To insert the fourth record of Table 9.6 where GPhone
is not given, we need to insert values in the other three
fields (GPhone was set to NULL by default at the time
of table creation). In this case, we have to specify the
names of attributes in which we want to insert values.
The values must be given in the same order in which
attributes are written in INSERT statement.

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mysql> INSERT INTO GUARDIAN(GUID, GName, GAddress)
-> VALUES (333333333333, 'Danny Dsouza',
-> 'S -13, Ashok Village, Daman' ); Query
OK, 1 row affected (0.03 sec)
Note: Text and date values must be enclosed in ‘ ’ (single quotes).

mysql> SELECT * from GUARDIAN;

+--------------+--------------+-----------+--------------------------------------------------------------------+
| GUID | GName | Gphone | GAddress |
+--------------+--------------+-----------+--------------------------------------------------------------------+
| 333333333333 | Danny Dsouza | NULL | S -13, Ashok Village,Daman|
| 444444444444 | Amit Ahuja | 5711492685| G-35, Ashok vihar, Delhi |
+--------------+--------------+-----------+--------------------------------------------------------------------+
2 rows in set (0.00 sec)
Let us now insert the records given in Table 9.7 into
the STUDENT table.
Table 9.7 STUDENT Table
RollNumber SName SDateofBirth GUID
1 Atharv Ahuja 2003-05-15 444444444444
2 Daizy Bhutia 2002-02-28 111111111111
3 Taleem Shah 2002-02-28
4 John Dsouza 2003-08-18 333333333333
5 Ali Shah 2003-07-05 101010101010
6 Manika P. 2002-03-10 466444444666
To insert the first record of Table 9.7, we write the
following MySQL statement
Activity 9.7
mysql> INSERT INTO STUDENT
-> VALUES(1,'Atharv Ahuja','2003-05-15', Write SQL statements
444444444444); to insert the
Query OK, 1 row affected (0.11 sec) OR remaining 4 rows
of table 9.7 in
SDateofBirth, GUID) table STUDENT.
mysql> INSERT INTO STUDENT (RollNumber, SName,
-> VALUES (1,'Atharv Ahuja','2003-05-15',
444444444444);
Query OK, 1 row affected (0.02 sec)

Recall that Date is stored in ‘YYYY-MM-DD’ format.

mysql> SELECT * from STUDENT;
+------------+--------------+--------------+-----------------------------------------------+
| RollNumber | SName | SDateofBirth | GUID |
+------------+--------------+--------------+-----------------------------------------------+
| 1 | Atharv Ahuja | 2003-05-15 | 444444444444 |
+------------+--------------+--------------+-----------------------------------------------+
1 row in set (0.00 sec)

Let us now insert the third record of Table 9.7

where GUID is NULL. Recall that GUID is foreign key of
this table and thus can take NULL value. Hence, we can
put NULLQUERY
STRUCTURED value for GUID
LANGUAGE (SQL) and insert the record by 143
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using the following statement:

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 mysql> INSERT INTO STUDENT
-> VALUES(3, 'Taleem Shah','2002-02-28', NULL);
Query OK, 1 row affected (0.05 sec)

mysql> SELECT * from STUDENT;

+------------+--------------+--------------+-----------------------------------------------+
| RollNumber | SName | SDateofBirth | GUID |
+------------+--------------+--------------+-----------------------------------------------+
| 1 | Atharv Ahuja | 2003-05-15 | 444444444444 |
| 3 | Taleem Shah | 2002-02-28 | NULL |
+------------+--------------+--------------+-----------------------------------------------+
2 rows in set (0.00 sec)

We had to write NULL in the above insert statement

because we are not mentioning the column names.
Otherwise, we should mention the names of attributes
along with the values if we need to insert data only for
• Which of the two certain attributes, as shown in the following query:
insert statement mysql> INSERT INTO STUDENT (RollNumber, SName,
should be used
-> SDateofBirth) VALUES (3, 'Taleem Shah','2002-02- 28');
when the order of
data to be inserted Query OK, 1 row affected (0.05 sec)
are not known?
• Can we insert two
records with the
9.6 SQL FOR DATA QUERY
same roll number? So far we have learnt how to create a database and
how to store and manipulate data in them. We are
interested in storing data in a database as it is easier to
retrieve data in future from databases in whatever
way we want. SQL provides efficient mechanisms to
retrieve data stored in multiple tables in MySQL
database (or any other RDBMS). The SQL statement
SELECT is used to retrieve data from the tables in a
database and is also called a query statement.
9.6.1 SELECT Statement
The SQL statement SELECT is used to retrieve data
from the tables in a database and the output is also
displayed in tabular form.
Syntax:
SELECT attribute1, attribute2, ... FROM
table_name
WHERE condition;
Here, attribute1, attribute2, are the column names
of the table table_name from which we want to retrieve
data. The FROM clause is always written with SELECT
clause as it specifies the name of the table from which
data is to be retrieved. The WHERE clause is optional and
is used to retrieve data that meet specified condition(s).
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 To select all the data available in a table, we use the
following select statement:
SELECT * FROM table_name;
Think and list few
Example 9.2 The following query retrieves the name and examples from your
date of birth of student with roll number 1: daily life where
storing the data in
mysql> SELECT SName, SDateofBirth
the database and
-> FROM STUDENT querying the same
-> WHERE RollNumber = 1; can be helpful.
+--------------+-------------------------------+
| SName | SDateofBirth |
+--------------+-------------------------------+
| Atharv Ahuja | 2003-05-15 |
+--------------+-------------------------------+
1 row in set (0.03 sec)

9.6.2 QUERYING using Database OFFICE

Organisations maintain databases to store data in the
form of tables. Let us consider the database OFFICE
of an organisation that has many related tables like
EMPLOYEE, DEPARTMENT and so on. Every EMPLOYEE
in the database is assigned to a DEPARTMENT and
his/her Department number (DeptId) is stored as a
foreign key in the table EMPLOYEE. Let us consider the
relation ‘EMPLOYEE’ as shown in Table 9.8 and apply
the SELECT statement to retrieve data:
Table 9.8 Records to be inserted into the EMPLOYEE table
EmpNo Ename Salary Bonus Deptld
101 Aaliya 10000 234 D02
102 Kritika 60000 123 D01
103 Shabbbir 45000 566 D01
104 Gurpreet 19000 565 D04
105 Joseph 34000 875 D03
106 Sanya 48000 695 D02
107 Vergese 15000 D01
108 Nachaobi 29000 D05
109 Daribha 42000 D04
110 Tanya 50000 467 D05

(A) Retrieve selected columns

The following query selects employee numbers of all the
employees:
mysql> SELECT EmpNo FROM EMPLOYEE;
+-----------+
| EmpNo |
+-----------+
| 101 |
| 102 |
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 NOTES | 103 |
| 104 |
| 105 |
| 106 |
| 107 |
| 108 |
| 109 |
| 110 |
+-----------+
10 rows in set (0.41 sec)
The following query selects the employee number
and employee name of all the employees, we write:
mysql> SELECT EmpNo, Ename FROM EMPLOYEE;
+-------+--------------------+
| EmpNo | Ename |
+-------+--------------------+
| 101 | Aaliya |
| 102 | Kritika |
| 103 | Shabbir |
| 104 | Gurpreet |
| 105 | Joseph |
| 106 | Sanya |
| 107 | Vergese |
| 108 | Nachaobi |
| 109 | Daribha |
| 110 | Tanya |
+-------+--------------------+
10 rows in set (0.00 sec)
(B) Renaming of columns
In case we want to rename any column while displaying
the output, it can be done by using the alias 'AS'. The
following query selects Employee name as Name in the
output for all the employees:
mysql> SELECT EName as Name FROM EMPLOYEE;
+----------------+
| Name |
+----------------+
| Aaliya |
| Kritika |
| Shabbir |
| Gurpreet |
| Joseph |
| Sanya |
| Vergese |
| Nachaobi |
| Daribha |
| Tanya |
+----------------+
10 rows in set (0.00 sec)

Example 9.3 Select names of all employees along with their

146 COMPUTERWhile
annual income (calculated as Salary*12). SCIENCEdisplaying
- CLASS XII
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t 12 FROM EMPLOYEE;
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mysql>
SELECT
EName
as
Name,
Salary*
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 +----------+-----------------------+
| Name | Salary*12 | NOTES
+----------+-----------------------+
| Aaliya | 120000 |
| Kritika | 720000 |
| Shabbir | 540000 |
| Gurpreet | 228000 |
| Joseph | 408000 |
| Sanya | 576000 |
| Vergese | 180000 |
| Nachaobi | 348000 |
| Daribha | 504000 |
| Tanya | 600000 |
+----------+-----------------------+
10 rows in set (0.02 sec)
Observe that in the output, Salary*12 is displayed
as the column name for the Annual Income column. In
the output table, we can use alias to rename that
column as Annual Income as shown below:
mysql> SELECT Ename AS Name, Salary*12 AS 'Annual Income’
-> FROM EMPLOYEE;
+----------+------------------------------+
| Name | Annual Income|
+----------+------------------------------+
| Aaliya | 120000 |
| Kritika | 720000 |
| Shabbir | 540000 |
| Gurpreet | 228000 |
| Joseph | 408000 |
| Sanya | 576000 |
| Vergese | 180000 |
| Nachaobi | 348000 |
| Daribha | 504000 |
| Tanya | 600000 |
+----------+------------------------------+
10 rows in set (0.00 sec)
Note: Annual Income will not be added as a new column in the
database table. It is just for displaying the output of the query.
If an aliased column name has space as in the case of Annual
Income, it should be enclosed in quotes as 'Annual Income
(C) Distinct Clause
By default, SQL shows all the data retrieved through
query as output. However, there can be duplicate values.
The SELECT statement when combined with DISTINCT
clause, returns records without repetition (distinct
records). For example, while retrieving a department
number from employee relation, there can be duplicate
values as many employees are assigned to the same
department. To select unique department number for
all the employees, we use DISTINCT as shown below:
mysql> SELECT DISTINCT DeptId FROM EMPLOYEE;

STRUCTURED QUERY LANGUAGE (SQL) 147

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 NOTES +------------+
| DeptId |
+------------+
| D02 |
| D01 |
| D04 |
| D03 |
| D05 |
+------------+
5 rows in set (0.03 sec)
(D) WHERE Clause
The WHERE clause is used to retrieve data that meet
some specified conditions. In the OFFICE database,
more than one employee can have the same salary.
Following query gives distinct salaries of the
employees working in the department number D01:
mysql> SELECT DISTINCT Salary
-> FROM EMPLOYEE
-> WHERE Deptid='D01';
As the column DeptId is of string type, its values are
enclosed in quotes ('D01').
+------------+
| Salary |
+------------+
| 60000 |
| 45000 |
| 15000 |
+------------+
3 rows in set (0.02 sec)
In the above example, = operator is used in the
WHERE clause. Other relational operators (<, <=, >, >=,
!=) can be used to specify such conditions. The logical
operators AND, OR, and NOT are used to combine
multiple conditions.
Example 9.4 Display all the details of those employees of
D04 department who earn more than 5000.
mysql> SELECT * FROM EMPLOYEE
-> WHERE Salary > 5000 AND DeptId = 'D04';
+-------+----------+--------+-------+-------------------------------+
| EmpNo | Ename | Salary | Bonus | DeptId |
+-------+----------+--------+-------+-------------------------------+
| 104 | Gurpreet | 19000 | 565 | D04 |
| 109 | Daribha | 42000 | NULL | D04 |
+-------+----------+--------+-------+-------------------------------+
2 rows in set (0.00 sec)

Example 9.5 The following query selects records of all the

employees except Aaliya.
mysql> SELECT * FROM EMPLOYEE
-> WHERE NOT Ename = 'Aaliya';
148 COMPUTER SCIENCE - CLASS XII
+-------+----------+--------+-------+-------------------------------+
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 | EmpNo | Ename | Salary | Bonus | DeptId |
+-------+----------+--------+-------+-------------------------------+
| 102 | Kritika | 60000 | 123 | D01 |
| 103 | Shabbir | 45000 | 566 | D01 |
| 104 | Gurpreet | 19000 | 565 | D04 |
| 105 | Joseph | 34000 | 875 | D03 |
| 106 | Sanya | 48000 | 695 | D02 |
| 107 | Vergese | 15000 | NULL | D01 |
| 108 | Nachaobi | 29000 | NULL | D05 |
| 109 | Daribha | 42000 | NULL | D04 |
| 110 | Tanya | 50000 | 467 | D05 |
+-------+----------+--------+-------+-------------------------------+ What will happen if
9 rows in set (0.00 sec) in the above query
we write “Aaliya” as
Example 9.6 The following query selects the name and “AALIYA” or “aaliya”
department number of all those employees who are earning or “AaLIYA”? Will the
salary between 20000 and 50000 (both values inclusive). query generate the
mysql> SELECT Ename, DeptId same output or an
-> FROM EMPLOYEE error?
-> WHERE Salary>=20000 AND Salary<=50000;
+----------+------------------+
| Ename | DeptId |
+----------+------------------+
| Shabbir | D01 |
| Joseph | D03 |
| Sanya | D02 |
| Nachaobi | D05 |
| Daribha | D04 |
| Tanya | D05 |
+----------+------------------+
6 rows in set (0.00 sec) SELECT Activity 9.8
* FROM EMPLOYEE Compare the output
WHERE Salary > 5000 OR DeptId= 20; produced by the query
in Example 9.6 and
The query in example 9.6 defines a range that can also the output of the
be checked using a comparison operator BETWEEN, as following query
shown below: and differentiate
mysql> SELECT Ename, DeptId between the
-> FROM EMPLOYEE OR and AND
-> WHERE Salary BETWEEN 20000 AND 50000; operators.
+----------+------------------+
| Ename | DeptId |
+----------+------------------+
| Shabbir | D01 |
| Joseph | D03 |
| Sanya | D02 |
| Nachaobi | D05 |
| Daribha | D04 |
| Tanya | D05 |
+----------+------------------+
6 rows in set (0.03 sec)
Note: The BETWEEN operator defines the range of values in which
the column value must fall into, to make the condition true.

Example 9.7 The following query selects details of all the

Semployees
TRUCTURED Qwho work
UERY L in (SQL)
ANGUAGE the departments having deptid D01, 149
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D02 or D04.

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 NOTES mysql> SELECT *
-> FROM EMPLOYEE
-> WHERE DeptId = 'D01' OR DeptId = 'D02' OR
DeptId = 'D04';
+-------+----------+--------+-------+-------------------------------+
| EmpNo | Ename | Salary | Bonus | DeptId |
+-------+----------+--------+-------+-------------------------------+
| 101 | Aaliya | 10000 | 234 | D02 |
| 102 | Kritika | 60000 | 123 | D01 |
| 103 | Shabbir | 45000 | 566 | D01 |
| 104 | Gurpreet | 19000 | 565 | D04 |
| 106 | Sanya | 48000 | 695 | D02 |
| 107 | Vergese | 15000 | NULL | D01 |
| 109 | Daribha | 42000 | NULL | D04 |
+-------+----------+--------+-------+-------------------------------+
7 rows in set (0.00 sec)
(E) Membership operator IN
The IN operator compares a value with a set of values
and returns true if the value belongs to that set. The
above query can be rewritten using IN operator as
shown below:
mysql> SELECT * FROM EMPLOYEE
-> WHERE DeptId IN ('D01', 'D02' , 'D04');
+-------+----------+--------+-------+-------------------------------+
| EmpNo | Ename | Salary | Bonus | DeptId |
+-------+----------+--------+-------+-------------------------------+
| 101 | Aaliya | 10000 | 234 | D02 |
| 102 | Kritika | 60000 | 123 | D01 |
| 103 | Shabbir | 45000 | 566 | D01 |
| 104 | Gurpreet | 19000 | 565 | D04 |
| 106 | Sanya | 48000 | 695 | D02 |
| 107 | Vergese | 15000 | NULL | D01 |
| 109 | Daribha | 42000 | NULL | D04 |
+-------+----------+--------+-------+-------------------------------+
7 rows in set (0.00 sec)

Example 9.8 The following query selects details of all the

employees except those working in department number D01
or D02.
mysql> SELECT * FROM EMPLOYEE
-> WHERE DeptId NOT IN('D01', 'D02');
+-------+----------+--------+-------+-------------------------------+
| EmpNo | Ename | Salary | Bonus | DeptId |
+-------+----------+--------+-------+-------------------------------+
| 104 | Gurpreet | 19000 | 565 | D04 |
| 105 | Joseph | 34000 | 875 | D03 |
| 108 | Nachaobi | 29000 | NULL | D05 |
| 109 | Daribha | 42000 | NULL | D04 |
| 110 | Tanya | 50000 | 467 | D05 |
+-------+----------+--------+-------+-------------------------------+
5 rows in set (0.00 sec)
150 COMPUTER SCIENCE - CLASS XII
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N ve all records except with DeptId D01 and D02.
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(F) ORDER BY Clause
ORDER BY clause is used to display data in an ordered
form with respect to a specified column. By default,
ORDER BY displays records in ascending order of
the specified column’s values. To display the records
in descending order, the DESC (means descending)
keyword needs to be written with that column.
Example 9.9 The following query selects details of all the
employees in ascending order of their salaries.
mysql> SELECT * FROM EMPLOYEE
-> ORDER BY Salary;
+-------+----------+--------+-------+-------------------------------+
| EmpNo | Ename | Salary | Bonus | DeptId |
+-------+----------+--------+-------+-------------------------------+
| 101 | Aaliya | 10000 | 234 | D02 |
| 107 | Vergese | 15000 | NULL | D01 |
| 104 | Gurpreet | 19000 | 565 | D04 |
| 108 | Nachaobi | 29000 | NULL | D05 |
| 105 | Joseph | 34000 | 875 | D03 |
| 109 | Daribha | 42000 | NULL | D04 |
| 103 | Shabbir | 45000 | 566 | D01 |
| 106 | Sanya | 48000 | 695 | D02 | Activity 9.9
| 110 | Tanya | 50000 | 467 | D05 |
| 102 | Kritika | 60000 | 123 | D01 | Execute the following
2 queries and find out
+-------+----------+--------+-------+-------------------------------+
what will happen if we
10 rows in set (0.05 sec)
specify two columns in
the ORDER BY clause:
Example 9.10 Select details of all the employees in descending
order of their salaries. SELECT * FROM
mysql> SELECT * FROM EMPLOYEE EMPLOYEE
-> ORDER BY Salary DESC; ORDER BY Salary,
+-------+----------+--------+-------+-------------------------------+ Bonus;
| EmpNo | Ename | Salary | Bonus | DeptId |
+-------+----------+--------+-------+-------------------------------+ SELECT * FROM
| 102 | Kritika | 60000 | 123 | D01 | EMPLOYEE
| 110 | Tanya | 50000 | 467 | D05 | ORDER BY
| 106 | Sanya | 48000 | 695 | D02 | Salary,Bonus
| 103 | Shabbir | 45000 | 566 | D01 |
| 109 | Daribha | 42000 | NULL | D04 |
| 105 | Joseph | 34000 | 875 | D03 |
| 108 | Nachaobi | 29000 | NULL | D05 |
| 104 | Gurpreet | 19000 | 565 | D04 |
| 107 | Vergese | 15000 | NULL | D01 |
| 101 | Aaliya | 10000 | 234 | D02 |
+-------+----------+--------+-------+-------------------------------+
10 rows in set (0.00 sec)
(G) Handling NULL Values
SQL supports a special value called NULL to represent
a missing or unknown value. For example, the Gphone
column in the GUARDIAN table can have missing value
for certain
STRUCTURED records.
QUERY Hence,
LANGUAGE (SQL) NULL is used to represent 151
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such unknown values. It is important to note that
NULL

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 NOTES is different from 0 (zero). Also, any arithmetic operation
performed with NULL value gives NULL. For example:
5 + NULL = NULL because NULL is unknown hence
the result is also unknown. In order to check for NULL
value in a column, we use IS NULL operator.
Example 9.11 The following query selects details of all those
employees who have not been given a bonus. This implies
that the bonus column will be blank.
mysql> SELECT * FROM EMPLOYEE
-> WHERE Bonus IS NULL;
+-------+----------+--------+-------+-------------------------------+
| EmpNo | Ename | Salary | Bonus | DeptId |
+-------+----------+--------+-------+-------------------------------+
| 107 | Vergese | 15000 | NULL | D01 |
| 108 | Nachaobi | 29000 | NULL | D05 |
| 109 | Daribha | 42000 | NULL | D04 |
+-------+----------+--------+-------+-------------------------------+
3 rows in set (0.00 sec)

Example 9.12 The following query selects names of all

employees who have been given a bonus (i.e., Bonus is not
null) and works in the department D01.
mysql> SELECT EName FROM EMPLOYEE
-> WHERE Bonus IS NOT NULL
-> AND DeptID = ‘D01’;
+----------------+
| EName |
+----------------+
| Kritika |
| Shabbir |
+----------------+
2 rows in set (0.00 sec)
(H) Substring pattern matching
Many a times we come across situations where we do
not want to query by matching exact text or value.
Rather, we are interested to find matching of only a few
characters or values in column values. For example,
to find out names starting with “T” or to find out pin
codes starting with ‘60’. This is called substring pattern
matching. We cannot match such patterns using =
operator as we are not looking for an exact match.
SQL provides a LIKE operator that can be used with
the WHERE clause to search for a specified pattern in
a column.
The LIKE operator makes use of the following two
wild card characters:
• % (per cent)- used to represent zero, one, or multiple
characters
152 COMPUTER SCIENCE - CLASS XII
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• _ (underscore)- used to represent exactly a single
character

Example 9.13 The following query selects details of all those

employees whose name starts with 'K'.
mysql> SELECT * FROM EMPLOYEE
-> WHERE Ename like 'K%';
+-------+---------+--------+-------+------------------------------+
| EmpNo | Ename | Salary | Bonus | DeptId | When we type first
+-------+---------+--------+-------+------------------------------+ letter of a contact
| 102 | Kritika | 60000 | 123 | D01 | name in our contact
+-------+---------+--------+-------+------------------------------+ list in our mobile
phones all the
1 row in set (0.00 sec)
names containing
Example 9.14 The following query selects details of all those that character are
displayed. Can you
employees whose name ends with 'a', and gets a salary more
relate SQL statement
than 45000. with the process?
mysql> SELECT * FROM EMPLOYEE List other real-life
-> WHERE Ename like '%a' situations where
-> AND Salary > 45000; you can visualise a
SQL statement in
+-------+---------+--------+-------+------------------------------+ operation.
| EmpNo | Ename | Salary | Bonus | DeptId |
+-------+---------+--------+-------+------------------------------+
| 102 | Kritika | 60000 | 123 | D01 |
| 106 | Sanya | 48000 | 695 | D02 |
| 110 | Tanya | 50000 | 467 | D05 |
+-------+---------+--------+-------+------------------------------+
3 rows in set (0.00 sec)

Example 9.15 The following query selects details of all

those employees whose name consists of exactly 5 letters
and starts with any letter but has ‘ANYA’ after that.
mysql> SELECT * FROM EMPLOYEE
-> WHERE Ename like '_ANYA';
+-------+-------+--------+-------+-----------------------------+
| EmpNo | Ename | Salary | Bonus | DeptId |
+-------+-------+--------+-------+-----------------------------+
| 106 | Sanya | 48000 | 695 | D02 |
| 110 | Tanya | 50000 | 467 | D05 |
+-------+-------+--------+-------+-----------------------------+
2 rows in set (0.00 sec)

Example 9.16 The following query selects names of all

employees containing 'se' as a substring in name.
mysql> SELECT Ename FROM EMPLOYEE
-> WHERE Ename like '%se%';
+--------------+
| Ename |
+--------------+
| Joseph |
| Vergese |
+--------------+
STRUCTURED QUERY LANGUAGE (SQL) 153
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2 rows in set (0.00 sec)

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 NOTES Example 9.17 The following query selects names of all
employees containing 'a' as the second character.
mysql> SELECT EName FROM EMPLOYEE
-> WHERE Ename like '_a%';
+----------------+
| EName |
+----------------+
| Aaliya |
| Sanya |
| Nachaobi |
| Daribha |
| Tanya |
+----------------+
5 rows in set (0.00 sec)

9.7 DATA UPDATION AND DELETION

Updation and deletion of data are also part of SQL Data
Manipulation Language (DML). In this section, we are
going to apply these two data manipulation methods
on the StudentAttendance database given in section
9.4.
9.7.1 Data Updation
We may need to make changes in the value(s) of one or
more columns of existing records in a table. For example,
we may require some changes in address, phone number
or spelling of name, etc. The UPDATE statement is used
to make such modifications in existing data.
Syntax:
UPDATE table_name
SET attribute1 = value1, attribute2 = value2, ... WHERE
condition;
STUDENT Table 9.7 has NULL value in GUID for the
student with roll number 3. Suppose students with roll
numbers 3 and 5 are siblings. Then, in the STUDENT
table, we need to fill the GUID value for the student
with roll number 3 as 101010101010. In order to
update or change GUID of a particular row (record), we
need to specify that record using WHERE clause, as
shown below:
mysql> UPDATE STUDENT
-> SET GUID = 101010101010
-> WHERE RollNumber = 3;
Query OK, 1 row affected (0.06 sec) Rows matched: 1 Changed: 1
Warnings: 0
We can then verify the updated data using the
statement SELECT * FROM STUDENT.
154 COMPUTER SCIENCE - CLASS XII
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Caution : If we miss the where clause in the UPDATE statement
then the GUID of all the records will be changed to
101010101010.
We can also update values for more than one column
using the UPDATE statement. Suppose, the guardian
with GUID 466444444666 has requested to change
Address to 'WZ - 68, Azad Avenue, Bijnour, MP' and
Phone number to '4817362092'.
mysql> UPDATE GUARDIAN
-> SET GAddress = 'WZ - 68, Azad Avenue,
-> Bijnour, MP', GPhone = 9010810547
-> WHERE GUID = 466444444666;
Query OK, 1 row affected (0.06 sec)
Rows matched: 1 Changed: 1 Warnings: 0
mysql> SELECT * FROM GUARDIAN ;
+------------+---------------+------------+--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
|GUID |GName |Gphone |GAddress |
+------------+---------------+------------+--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
|444444444444|Amit Ahuja |5711492685 |G-35, Ashok vihar, Delhi |
|111111111111|Baichung Bhutia|3612967082 |Flat no. 5, Darjeeling Appt., Shimla |
|101010101010|Himanshu Shah |4726309212 |26/77, West Patel Nagar, Ahmedabad |
|333333333333|Danny Dsouza |NULL |S -13, Ashok Village, Daman |
|466444444666|Sujata P. |3801923168 |WZ - 68, Azad Avenue, Bijnour, MP |
+------------+---------------+------------+--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
5 rows in set (0.00 sec)

9.7.2 Data Deletion

DELETE statement is used to delete/remove one or
more records from a table.
Syntax:
DELETE FROM table_name
WHERE condition;
Suppose the student with roll number 2 has left the
school. We can use the following MySQL statement to
delete that record from the STUDENT table.
mysql> DELETE FROM STUDENT WHERE RollNumber = 2;
Query OK, 1 row affected (0.06 sec)

mysql> SELECT * FROM STUDENT ;

+------------+--------------+--------------+-----------------------------------------------+
| RollNumber | SName | SDateofBirth | GUID |
+------------+--------------+--------------+-----------------------------------------------+
| 1 | Atharv Ahuja | 2003-05-15 | 444444444444 |
| 3 | Taleem Shah | 2002-02-28 | 101010101010 |
| 4 | John Dsouza | 2003-08-18 | 333333333333 |
| 5 | Ali Shah | 2003-07-05 | 101010101010 |
| 6 | Manika P. | 2002-03-10 | 466444444666 |
+------------+--------------+--------------+-----------------------------------------------+
5 rows in set (0.00 sec)

Caution: Like UPDATE statement, we need to be careful to include

the
S WHEREQUERY
TRUCTURED clause while (SQL)
LANGUAGE using a DELETE statement to delete 155
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records in a table. Otherwise, all the records in the table will get
deleted.

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 9.8 FUNCTIONS IN SQL
In this section, we will understand how to use single
row functions, multiple row functions, group records
based on some criteria, and working on multiple tables
using SQL.

Customer
Inventory
CustID
CarID
CustName
CarName
CustAdd
Price
Phone
Model
Email
YearManufacture
FuelType Sale

InvoiceNo Employee
CarID
CustID EmpID
SaleDate EmpName
PaymentMode DOB
EmpID DOJ
SalePrice Designaiton
Salary

Figure 9.2: Schema diagram of database CARSHOWROOM

Let us create a database called CARSHOWROOM

having the schema as shown in Figure 9.2 It has the
following four relations:
1) INVENTORY: Stores name, price, model, year
of manufacturing, and fuel type for each car in
inventory of the showroom,
2) CUSTOMER: Stores customer id, name, address,
phone number and email for each customer,
3) SALE: Stores the invoice number, car id, customer
id, sale date, mode of payment, sales person’s
employee id and selling price of the car sold,
4) EMPLOYEE: Stores employee id, name, date of
birth, date of joining, designation and salary of
each employee in the showroom.
The records of the four relations are shown in Tables
9.9, 9.10, 9.11, and 9.12, respectively.
Table 9.9 INVENTORY
mysql> SELECT * FROM INVENTORY;
+--------+--------------+------------+-------------+-------------------+---------------------------------------------------------------+
| CarId | CarName | Price | Model | YearManufacture | Fueltype |
+--------+--------------+------------+-------------+-------------------+---------------------------------------------------------------+
| D001 | Dzire | 582613.00 | LXI | 2017 | Petrol |

156 COMPUTER SCIENCE - CLASS XII

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| D002 | Dzire | 673112.00 | VXI | 2018 | Petrol |
| B001 | Baleno | 567031.00 | Sigma1.2 | 2019 | Petrol |
| B002 | Baleno | 647858.00 | Delta1.2 | 2018 | Petrol |
| E001 | EECO | 355205.00 | 5 STR STD | 2017 | CNG |
| E002 | EECO | 654914.00 | CARE | 2018 | CNG |
| S001 | SWIFT | 514000.00 | LXI | 2017 | Petrol |
| S002 | SWIFT | 614000.00 | VXI | 2018 | Petrol |
+--------+--------------+------------+-------------+-------------------+---------------------------------------------------------------+
8 rows in set (0.00 sec)

Table 9.10 CUSTOMER

mysql> SELECT * FROM CUSTOMER;
+--------+--------------+-------------------------+------------+-----------------------------------------------------------------------+
| CustId | CustName | CustAdd | Phone | Email |
+--------+--------------+-------------------------+------------+-----------------------------------------------------------------------+
| C0001 | Amit Saha | L-10, Pitampura | 4564587852 | [email protected] |
| C0002 | Rehnuma | J-12, SAKET | 5527688761 | [email protected] |
| C0003 | Charvi Nayyar| 10/9, FF, Rohini | 6811635425 | [email protected] |
| C0004 | Gurpreet | A-10/2, SF, Mayur Vihar | 3511056125 | [email protected] |
+--------+--------------+-------------------------+------------+-----------------------------------------------------------------------+
4 rows in set (0.00 sec)

Table 9.11 SALE

mysql> SELECT * FROM SALE;
+-----------+-------+--------+------------+--------------+-------+-----------------------------------------------------+
| InvoiceNo | CarId | CustId | SaleDate | PaymentMode | EmpID | SalePrice |
+-----------+-------+--------+------------+--------------+-------+-----------------------------------------------------+
| I00001 | D001 | C0001 | 2019-01-24 | Credit Card | E004 | 613248.00 |
| I00002 | S001 | C0002 | 2018-12-12 | Online | E001 | 590321.00 |
| I00003 | S002 | C0004 | 2019-01-25 | Cheque | E010 | 604000.00 |
| I00004 | D002 | C0001 | 2018-10-15 | Bank Finance | E007 | 659982.00 |
| I00005 | E001 | C0003 | 2018-12-20 | Credit Card | E002 | 369310.00 |
| I00006 | S002 | C0002 | 2019-01-30 | Bank Finance | E007 | 620214.00 |
+-----------+-------+--------+------------+--------------+-------+-----------------------------------------------------+
6 rows in set (0.00 sec)

Table 9.12 EMPLOYEE

mysql> SELECT * FROM EMPLOYEE;
+-------+----------+------------+------------+--------------+----------------------------------------------+
| EmpID | EmpName | DOB | DOJ | Designation | Salary |
+-------+----------+------------+------------+--------------+----------------------------------------------+
| E001 | Rushil | 1994-07-10 | 2017-12-12 | Salesman | 25550 |
| E002 | Sanjay | 1990-03-12 | 2016-06-05 | Salesman | 33100 |
| E003 | Zohar | 1975-08-30 | 1999-01-08 | Peon | 20000 |
| E004 | Arpit | 1989-06-06 | 2010-12-02 | Salesman | 39100 |
| E006 | Sanjucta | 1985-11-03 | 2012-07-01 | Receptionist | 27350 |
| E007 | Mayank | 1993-04-03 | 2017-01-01 | Salesman | 27352 |
| E010 | Rajkumar | 1987-02-26 | 2013-10-23 | Salesman | 31111 |
+-------+----------+------------+------------+--------------+----------------------------------------------+
7 rows in set (0.00 sec)

We know that a function is used to perform some

particular task and it returns zero or more values as a
result. Functions are useful while writing SQL queries
also. Functions can be applied to work on single or
multiple records (rows) of a table. Depending on their
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application in one or multiple rows, SQL functions are

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 categorised as Single Row functions and Aggregate
functions.
9.8.1 Single Row Functions
These are also known as Scalar functions. Single row
functions are applied on a single value and return
a single value. Figure 9.3 lists different single row
functions under three categories — Numeric (Math),
String, Date and Time.
Math Functions
Single Row Functions
accept numeric value
as input and return
Numeric Functions String Functions Date Functions a numeric value
UCASE() NOW() as a result. String
POWER()
LCASE() DATE() Functions accept
ROUND()
MID() MONTH()
character value as
MOD()
input and return
LENGTH() MONTHNAME()
either character or
LEFT() YEAR()
numeric values as
RIGHT() DAY()
output. Date and
INSERT() DAYNAME() Time functions accept
LTRIM() date and time value
RTRIM() as input and return
TRIM() numeric or string
or Date and Time
Figure 9.3: Three categories of single-row functions in SQL
as output.
(A) Math Functions
Three commonly used numeric functions are POWER(),
ROUND() and MOD(). Their usage along with syntax is
given in Table 9.13.

Table 9.13 Math Functions

Function Description Example with output
POWER(X,Y) Calculates X to the power Y. mysql> SELECT POWER(2,3);
can also be written as Output:
POW(X,Y) 8
ROUND(N,D) Rounds off number N to D mysql>SELECT ROUND(2912.564, 1);
number of decimal places. Output:
Note: If D=0, then it rounds 2912.6
off the number to the nearest mysql> SELECT ROUND(283.2);
integer. Output:
283
MOD(A, B) Returns the remain mysql> SELECT MOD(21, 2);
der after dividing number A by Output:
number B. 1

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Example 9.18 In order to increase sales, suppose the car
dealer decides to offer his customers to pay the total
amount in 10 easy EMIs (equal monthly instalments).
Assume that EMIs are required to be in multiples of
10000. For that, the dealer wants to list the CarID and Price
along with the following data from the Inventory table:
a) Calculate GST as 12 per cent of Price and display the
result after rounding it off to one decimal place.
mysql> SELECT ROUND(12/100*Price,1) "GST" FROM
INVENTORY;
+-------------------+
| GST |
+-------------------+
| 69913.6 |
| 80773.4 | Activity 9.10
| 68043.7 |
| 77743.0 | Using the table SALE
| 42624.6 | of CARSHOWROOM
| 78589.7 | database, write
| 61680.0 | SQL queries for the
| 73680.0 | following:
+-------------------+ a) Display the
8 rows in set (0.00 sec) InvoiceNo and
commission value
b) Add a new column FinalPrice to the table inventory rounded off to zero
which will have the value as sum of Price and 12 per decimal places.
cent of the GST. b) Display the details
mysql> ALTER TABLE INVENTORY ADD(FinalPrice of SALE where
Numeric(10,1)); payment mode
Query OK, 8 rows affected (0.03 sec) Records: 8 is credit
Duplicates: 0 Warnings: 0 card.

mysql> UPDATE INVENTORY SET

FinalPrice=Price+Round(Price*12/100,1); Query OK,
8 rows affected (0.01 sec)
Rows matched: 8 Changed: 8 Warnings: 0
mysql> SELECT * FROM INVENTORY;
+-------+--------+-----------+-----------+----------------+----------+---------------------------------------------------------+
| CarId |CarName | Price | Model |YearManufacture | FuelType | FinalPrice |
+-------+--------+-----------+-----------+----------------+----------+---------------------------------------------------------+
| D001 | Dzire | 582613.00 | LXI | 2017 | Petrol | 652526.6 |
| D002 | Dzire | 673112.00 | VXI | 2018 | Petrol | 753885.4 |
| B001 | Baleno | 567031.00 | Sigma1.2 | 2019 | Petrol | 635074.7 |
| B002 | Baleno | 647858.00 | Delta1.2 | 2018 | Petrol | 725601.0 |
| E001 | EECO | 355205.00 | 5 STR STD | 2017 | CNG | 397829.6 |
| E002 | EECO | 654914.00 | CARE | 2018 | CNG | 733503.7 |
| S001 | SWIFT | 514000.00 | LXI | 2017 | Petrol | 575680.0 |
| S002 | SWIFT | 614000.00 | VXI | 2018 | Petrol | 687680.0 |
+-------+--------+-----------+-----------+----------------+----------+---------------------------------------------------------+
8 rows in set (0.00 sec)

c) Calculate and display the amount to be paid

each month (in multiples of 1000) which is to be
calculated after dividing the FinalPrice of the car into
STRUCTURED QUERY LANGUAGE (SQL) 159
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10 instalments.

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 d) After dividing the amount into EMIs, find out the
remaining amount to be paid immediately, by
performing modular division.
Following SQL query can be used to solve the
above mentioned (c) and (d) problem:
mysql> SELECT CarId, FinalPrice, ROUND(FinalPrice-
MOD(FinalPrice,1000)/10,0) "EMI",
MOD(FinalPrice,10000) "Remaining Amount" FROM INVENTORY;
+-------+--------------+---------+-----------------------------------------------+
| CarId | FinalPrice | EMI | Remaining Amount |
+-------+--------------+---------+-----------------------------------------------+
| D001 | 652526.6 6
| 52474 |2526.6 |
| D002 | 753885.4 7
| 53797 |3885.4 |
| B001 | 635074.7 6
| 35067 |5074.7 |
| B002 | 725601.0 7
| 25541 |5601.0 |
| E001 | 397829.6 3
| 97747 |7829.6 |
| E002 | 733503.7 7
| 33453 |3503.7 |
| S001 | 575680.0 5
| 75612 |5680.0 |
| S002 | 687680.0 6
| 87612 |7680.0 |
+-------+--------------+---------+-----------------------------------------------+
8 rows in set (0.00 sec)

Example 9.19
a) Let us now add a new column Commission to the
SALE table. The column Commission should have
a total length of 7 in which 2 decimal places to
be there.
mysql> ALTER TABLE SALE ADD(Commission
Numeric(7,2));
Query OK, 6 rows affected (0.34 sec)
Records: 6 Duplicates: 0 Warnings: 0
b) Let us now calculate commission for sales agents as
12% of the SalePrice, Insert the values to the newly
added column Commission and then display
records of the table SALE where commission >
73000.
mysql> UPDATE SALE SET
Commission=12/100*SalePrice;
Query OK, 6 rows affected (0.06 sec)
Rows matched: 6 Changed: 6 Warnings: 0

mysql> SELECT * FROM SALE WHERE Commission > 73000;

+----------+------+--------+-----------+-------------+-------+-----------+----------------------------------------------------------+
|invoiceno |carid | custid | saledate | paymentmode | empid | saleprice | Commission |
+----------+------+--------+-----------+-------------+-------+-----------+----------------------------------------------------------+
|I00001 |D001 | C0001 | 2019-01-24 |Credit Card | E004 | 613248.00 |73589.64 |
|I00004 |D002 | C0001 | 2018-10-15 |Bank Finance| E007 | 659982.00 |79198.84 |
|I00006 |S002 | C0002 | 2019-01-30 |Bank Finance | E007 | 620214.00 |74425.68 |
+----------+------+--------+-----------+-------------+-------+-----------+----------------------------------------------------------+
3 rows in set (0.02 sec)

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c) Display InvoiceNo, SalePrice and Commission such
that commission value is rounded off to 0.
Activity 9.11
mysql> SELECT InvoiceNo, SalePrice,
Round(Commission,0) FROM SALE; Using the table
INVENTORY from
+-----------+-----------+-----------------------------------------------+
CARSHOWROOM
| InvoiceNo | SalePrice | Round(Commission,0) |
database, write
+-----------+-----------+-----------------------------------------------+ sql queries for the
| I00001 | 613248.00 | 73590 |
following:
| I00002 | 590321.00 | 70839 |
a) Convert the CarMake
| I00003 | 604000.00 | 72480 |
| I00004 | 659982.00 | 79198 | to uppercase if its value
| I00005 | 369310.00 | 44317 | starts with the letter
| I00006 | 620214.00 | 74426 | ‘B’.
+-----------+-----------+-----------------------------------------------+ b) If the length of the car’s
model is greater than 4
6 rows in set (0.00 sec)
then fetch the substring
(B) String Functions starting from position
String functions can perform various operations on 3 till the end
from attribute
alphanumeric data which are stored in a table. They Model.
can be used to change the case (uppercase to
lowercase or vice-versa), extract a substring, calculate
the length of a string and so on. String functions and
their usage are shown in Table 9.14.
Table 9.14 String Functions

Function Description Example with output

UCASE(string) converts string into uppercase. mysql> SELECT
OR UCASE(“Informatics
UPPER(string)
Practices”); Output:
INFORMATICS PRACTICES
LOWER(string) converts string into lowercase. mysql> SELECT
OR LOWER(“Informatics
LCASE(string)
Practices”); Output:
informatics practices
MID(string, pos, n) Returns a substring of size n mysql> SELECT
OR starting from the specified position MID(“Informatics”, 3, 4);
SUBSTRING(string, (pos) of the string. If n is not
Output:
pos, n) specified, it returns the substring
OR from the position pos till end of form
SUBSTR(string, pos, n) the string.
mysql> SELECT
MID(‘Informatics’,7); Output:
atics
LENGTH(string) Return the number of characters mysql> SELECT
in the specified string. LENGTH(“Informatics”); Output:
11

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 LEFT(string, N) Returns N number of characters mysql> SELECT
from the left side of the string. LEFT(“Computer”, 4); Output:
Comp

RIGHT(string, N) Returns N number

Example of characters
9.20 mysql>
Let us use Customer SELECTshown in Table
relation
from the right side of the string. RIGHT(“SCIENCE”, 3); NCE
Activity 9.12 9.10 to understand the working of string functions.
INSTR(string,
Using the table Returns a) the
Display customer
position name inmysql>
of the first lowerSELECT
case and customer
substring)
EMPLOYEE from occurrenceemail in upper
of the case
substring in from INSTR(“Informatics”,
table CUSTOMER.
CARSHOWROOM the given string. Returns 0, if the
“ma”);
database, write substring ismysql>
not present
SELECT in LOWER(CustName),
the
string. Output: UPPER(Email) FROM
SQL queries for the CUSTOMER;
6
following: +-----------------+---------------------------------------------+
a)LTRIM(string)
Display employee name Returns the given string after
| LOWER(CustName) mysql> SELECT LENGTH(“
and the last removing
2 leading white space | UPPER(Email)DELHI”), LENGTH(LTRIM(“
|
characters of his EmpId.characters. +-----------------+---------------------------------------------+
DELHI”));
b) Display designation | amit saha | [email protected] |
Output:
of employee and the | rehnuma | [email protected] |
+--------+-----------------+
position of | charvi nayyar | [email protected]
|7 |5 ||
character ‘e’ in | gurpreet | [email protected] |
designation, if
+--------+-----------------+
+-----------------+---------------------------------------------+
1 row in set (0.00 sec)
present.
RTRIM(string) Returns the 4 rows
givenin string
set (0.00 sec)
after mysql>SELECT LENGTH(“PEN
removing trailing the
b) Display white spaceof the email
length and part of the“));
“)LENGTH(RTRIM(“PEN email
characters.
from the email id before the character ‘@’. Note - Do
Output:
not print ‘@’. +--------+-----------------+
|5|3|
mysql> SELECT LENGTH(Email), LEFT(Email, INSTR(Email,
+--------+-----------------+
"@")-1) FROM CUSTOMER;
1 row in set (0.00 sec)
TRIM(string) Returns the given string after mysql> SELECT LENGTH(“
removing both leading and MADAM “),LENGTH(TRIM(“
trailing white space characters.
MADAM “));
Output:
+--------+-----------------+
|9|5|
+--------+-----------------+
1 row in set (0.00 sec)

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 +---------------+-----------------------------------------------------------------+
| LENGTH(Email) | LEFT(Email, INSTR(Email, "@")-1) |
+---------------+-----------------------------------------------------------------+
| 19 | amitsaha2 |
| 19 | rehnuma |
| 19 | charvi123 |
Activity 9.13
| 19 | gur_singh |
+---------------+-----------------------------------------------------------------+ Using the table
4 rows in set (0.03 sec) EMPLOYEE of
CARSHOWROOM
The function INSTR will return the position of “@” in database, list the
the email address. So, to print email id without “@” we day of birth for all
have to use position -1. employees whose
salary is more
c) Let us assume that four-digit area code is reflected than 25000.
in the mobile number starting from position
number 3. For example, 1851 is the area code of
mobile number 9818511338. Now, write the SQL
query to display the area code of the customer
living in Rohini.
mysql> SELECT MID(Phone,3,4) FROM CUSTOMER WHERE
CustAdd like ‘%Rohini%’;
+--------------------------+
| MID(Phone,3,4) |
+--------------------------+
| 1163 |
+--------------------------+
Can we use arithmetic
1 row in set (0.00 sec) operators (+, -. *, or /)
d) Display emails after removing the domain name on date functions?
extension “.com” from emails of the customers.
mysql> SELECT TRIM(“.com” from Email) FROM CUSTOMER;
+-----------------------------------------+
| TRIM(".com" FROM Email) |
+-----------------------------------------+
| amitsaha2@gmail |
| rehnuma@hotmail |
| charvi123@yahoo |
| gur_singh@yahoo |
+-----------------------------------------+
4 rows in set (0.00 sec)
e) Display details of all the customers having yahoo
emails only.
mysql> SELECT * FROM CUSTOMER WHERE Email LIKE "%yahoo%";
+--------+--------------+-------------------------+------------+------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| CustID | CustName | CustAdd | Phone | Email |
+--------+--------------+-------------------------+------------+------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| C0003 | Charvi Nayyar| 10/9, FF, Rohini | 6811635425 | [email protected] |
| C0004 | Gurpreet | A-10/2, SF, Mayur Vihar | 3511056125 | [email protected] |
+--------+--------------+-------------------------+------------+------------------------------------------------------------------------+
2 rows in set (0.00 sec)

(C) Date Qand

STRUCTURED UERY Time Functions
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There are various functions that are used to perform
operations on date and time data. Some of the operations

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 include displaying the current date, extracting each
element of a date (day, month and year), displaying day
of the week and so on. Table 9.15 explains various date
and time functions.
Table 9.15 Date Functions
Function Description Example with output
NOW() It returns the current system date mysql> SELECT NOW();
and time. Output:
2019-07-11 19:41:17
DATE() It returns the date part from the mysql> SELECT DATE(NOW());
given date/time expression. Output:
2019-07-11
MONTH(date) It returns the month in numeric mysql> SELECT MONTH(NOW());
form from the date. Output:
7
MONTHNAME(date) It returns the month name from mysql> SELECT
the specified date. MONTHNAME(“2003-11-28”);
Output:
Novembe
r
YEAR(date) It returns the year from the date. mysql> SELECT YEAR(“2003-10-
03”);
Output:
2003
DAY(date) It returns the day part from the mysql> SELECT DAY(“2003-03- 24”);
date. Output:
24

DAYNAME(date) It returns the name of the day mysql> SELECT

from the date. DAYNAME(“2019-07-11”);
Output:

Example 9.21 Let us use the EMPLOYEE table of

CARSHOWROOM database to illustrate the working of some
Activity 9.14 of the date and time functions.
a) Find sum of Sale a) Select the day, month number and year of joining of
Price of the cars
purchased by the all employees.
customer having ID mysql> SELECT
C0001 from table | 12 | DAY(DOJ),12 MONTH(DOJ),
| 2017YEAR(DOJ)
| FROM
SALE. EMPLOYEE;
| 5| 6| 2016 |
+----------+------------+-------------------------------+
| 8| 1| 1999 |
b) Find the
| DAY(DOJ) 2| MONTH(DOJ)
| |12
YEAR(DOJ)
| |
2010 |
maximum and | 1| 7| 2012 |
minimum +----------+------------+-------------------------------+
commission | 1| 1| 2017 |
from the | 23 | 10 | 2013 |
+----------+------------+-------------------------------+
SALE table.
7 rows in set (0.03 sec)

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b) If the date of joining is not a Sunday, then
display it in the following format "Wednesday, 26,
November, 1979."
mysql> SELECT DAYNAME(DOJ), DAY(DOJ),
MONTHNAME(DOJ), YEAR(DOJ) FROM EMPLOYEE
WHERE DAYNAME(DOJ)!='Sunday';
+--------------+----------+----------------+------------------------------------------+
| DAYNAME(DOJ) | DAY(DOJ) | MONTHNAME(DOJ) | YEAR(DOJ) |
+--------------+----------+----------------+------------------------------------------+
| Tuesday | 12 | December | 2017 |
| Friday | 8 | January | 1999 |
| Thursday | 2 | December | 2010 |
| Wednesday | 23 | October | 2013 |
+--------------+----------+----------------+------------------------------------------+
4 rows in set (0.00 sec)

9.8.2 Aggregate Functions

Aggregate functions are also called Multiple Row
functions. These functions work on a set of records as
a whole and return a single value for each column of
the records on which the function is applied. Table 9.16
shows the differences between single row functions and
multiple row functions. Table 9.17 describes some of
the aggregate functions along with their usage. Note
that column must be of numeric type.
Table 9.16 Differences between Single and Multiple Row Functions

Single Row Function Multiple row function

1. It operates on a single row at a time. 1. It operates on groups of rows.

2. It returns one result per row. 2. It returns one result for a group of rows.
3. It can be used in Select, Where, and Order by 3. It can be used in the select clause only.
clause. 4. Max(), Min(), Avg(), Sum(), Count() and
4. Math, String and Date functions are Count(*) are examples of multiple row
examples of single row functions. functions.

Table 9.17 Aggregate Functions in SQL

Function Description Example with output
MAX(column) Returns the largest value from mysql> SELECT MAX(Price) FROM
the specified column. INVENTORY;
Output: 673112.00

MIN(column) Returns the smallest value from mysql> SELECT MIN(Price) FROM
the specified column. INVENTORY;
Output: 355205.00

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 AVG(column) Returns the average of the values mysql> SELECT AVG(Price) FROM
in the specified column. INVENTORY;
Output:
576091.625000

SUM(column) Returns the sum of the values mysql> SELECT SUM(Price) FROM
for the specified column. INVENTORY;
Output:
4608733.00
COUNT(*) Returns the number of records mysql> SELECT COUNT(*) from
in a table. MANAGER;
+---------------+
Note: In order to display the | count(*) |
number of records that matches +---------------+
a particular criteria in the table, | 4|
we have to use COUNT(*) with +---------------+
WHERE clause.
1 row in set (0.00 sec)
COUNT(column) Returns the number of values mysql> SELECT * from MANAGER;
in the specified column ignoring +------ +------------------+
the NULL values. | MNO | MEMNAME |
+------ +------------------+
Note: | 1 | AMIT |
In this example, let us consider | 2 | KAVREET |
Example 9.22
a MANAGER table having two | 3 | KAVITA |
attributesa)andDisplay
four records.
the total | number 4 | NULLof records| from table
INVENTORY having a model as VXI.
mysql> SELECT COUNT(*) FROM INVENTORY WHERE
Model=”VXI”;
+----------------+
| COUNT(*) |
+----------------+
|
available 2 | table INVENTORY.
from
mysql> SELECT COUNT(DISTINCT Model) FROM
INVENTORY;

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 +-------------------------------------+ Activity 9.15
| COUNT(DISTINCT MODEL) |
+-------------------------------------+ a) List the total number
of cars sold by each
| 6|
employee.
+-------------------------------------+
1 row in set (0.09 sec) b) List the maximum
sale made
c) Display the average price of all the cars with Model by each
LXI from table INVENTORY. employee.
mysql> SELECT AVG(Price) FROM INVENTORY WHERE
Model="LXI";
+------------------------+
| AVG(Price) |
+------------------------+
| 548306.500000 |
+------------------------+
1 row in set (0.03 sec)

9.9 GROUP BY CLAUSE IN SQL

At times we need to fetch a group of rows on the basis
of common values in a column. This can be done using
a group by clause. It groups the rows together that
contains the same values in a specified column. We
can use the aggregate functions (COUNT, MAX, MIN,
AVG and SUM) to work on the grouped values. HAVING
Clause in SQL is used to specify conditions on the rows
with Group By clause.
Consider the SALE table from the CARSHOWROOM
database:

mysql> SELECT * FROM SALE;

+---------+------+-------+------------+-------------+------+----------+-----------------------------------------------------+
|InvoiceNo|CarId |CustId | SaleDate | PaymentMode |EmpID |SalePrice |Commission|
+---------+------+-------+------------+-------------+------+----------+-----------------------------------------------------+
| I00001 | D001 | C0001 | 2019-01-24 | Credit Card | E004 |613248.00 | 73589.64 |
| I00002 | S001 | C0002 | 2018-12-12 | Online | E001 |590321.00 | 70838.52 |
| I00003 | S002 | C0004 | 2019-01-25 | Cheque | E010 |604000.00 | 72480.00 |
| I00004 | D002 | C0001 | 2018-10-15 | Bank Finance| E007 |659982.00 | 79198.84 |
| I00005 | E001 | C0003 | 2018-12-20 | Credit Card | E002 |369310.00 | 44318.20 |
| I00006 | S002 | C0002 | 2019-01-30 | Bank Finance| E007 |620214.00 | 74425.68 |
+---------+------+-------+------------+-------------+------+----------+-----------------------------------------------------+
6 rows in set (0.11 sec)

CarID, CustID, SaleDate, PaymentMode, EmpID,

SalePrice are the columns that can have rows with the
same values in it. So, Group by clause can be used
in these columns to find the number of records of a
particular type (column), or to calculate the sum of the
price of each car type.
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 NOTES Example 9.23
a) Display the number of Cars purchased by each
Customer from SALE table.
mysql> SELECT CustID, COUNT(*) "Number of Cars" FROM
SALE GROUP BY CustID;
+--------+------------------------------+
| CustID | Number of Cars |
+--------+------------------------------+
| C0001 | 2 |
| C0002 | 2 |
| C0003 | 1 |
| C0004 | 1 |
+--------+------------------------------+
4 rows in set (0.00 sec)
b) Display the Customer Id and number of cars
purchased if the customer purchased more than 1
car from SALE table.
mysql> SELECT CustID, COUNT(*) FROM SALE GROUP BY
CustID HAVING Count(*)>1;
+--------+--------------------+
| CustID | COUNT(*) |
+--------+--------------------+
| C0001 | 2|
| C0002 | 2|
+--------+--------------------+
2 rows in set (0.30 sec)
c) Display the number of people in each category of
payment mode from the table SALE.
mysql> SELECT PaymentMode, COUNT(PaymentMode)
FROM SALE GROUP BY Paymentmode ORDER BY
Paymentmode;
+--------------+-----------------------------------------+
| PaymentMode | Count(PaymentMode) |
+--------------+-----------------------------------------+
| Bank Finance | 2|
| Cheque | 1|
| Credit Card | 2|
| Online | 1|
+--------------+-----------------------------------------+
4 rows in set (0.00 sec)
d) Display the PaymentMode and number of payments
made using that mode more than once.
mysql> SELECT PaymentMode, Count(PaymentMode)
FROM SALE GROUP BY Paymentmode HAVING
COUNT(*)>1
ORDER BY Paymentmode;
+--------------+-----------------------------------------+
| PaymentMode | Count(PaymentMode) |
+--------------+-----------------------------------------+
| Bank Finance | 2|
168 | Credit Card | COMPUTER2S|CIENCE - CLASS XII
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9.10 OPERATIONS ON RELATIONS NOTES
We can perform certain operations on relations like
Union, Intersection and Set Difference to merge the
tuples of two tables. These three operations are binary
operations as they work upon two tables. Note here that
these operations can only be applied if both the relations
have the same number of attributes and corresponding
attributes in both tables have the same domain.
9.10.1 UNION ()
This operation is used to combine the selected rows of
two tables at a time. If some rows are same in both
the tables, then result of the Union operation will
show those rows only once. Figure 9.4 shows union of
two sets.
Music Dance

Figure 9.4: Union of two sets

Let us consider two relations DANCE and MUSIC
shown in Tables 9.18 and 9.19 respectively.
Table 9.18 DANCE
+------+--------+-------------------+
| SNo | Name | Class |
+------+--------+-------------------+
|1 | Aastha | 7A |
|2 | Mahira | 6A |
|3 | Mohit | 7B |
|4 | Sanjay | 7A |
+------+--------+-------------------+

Table 9.19 MUSIC

+------+---------+-------------------+
| SNo | Name | Class |
+------+---------+-------------------+
|1 | Mehak | 8A |
|2 | Mahira | 6A |
|3 | Lavanya | 7A |
|4 | Sanjay | 7A |
|5 | Abhay | 8A |
+------+---------+-------------------+
If we need the list of students participating in either
of events, then we have to apply UNION operation
(represented by symbol U) on relations DANCE and
MUSIC. The output of UNION operation is shown in
Table 9.20.
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 NOTES Table 9.20 DANCE U MUSIC
+------+---------+-------------------+
| SNo | Name | Class |
+------+---------+-------------------+
| 1 | Aastha | 7A |
| 2 | Mahira | 6A |
| 3 | Mohit | 7B |
| 4 | Sanjay | 7A |
| 1 | Mehak | 8A |
| 3 | Lavanya | 7A |
| 5 | Abhay | 8A |
+------+---------+-------------------+

9.10.2 INTERSECT (∩)

Intersect operation is used to get the common tuples
from two tables and is represented by symbol ∩. Figure
9.5 shows intersection of two sets.
Music Dance

Figure 9.5: Intersection of two sets

Suppose, we have to display the list of students

who are participating in both the events (DANCE and
MUSIC), then intersection operation is to be applied on
these two tables. The output of INTERSECT operation is
shown in Table 9.21.
Table 9.21 DANCE ∩ MUSIC
+----+---------+------------------+
| SNo| Name | Class |
+----+---------+------------------+
| 2 | Mahira | 6A |
| 4 | Sanjay | 7A |
+----+---------+------------------+

9.10.3 MINUS (-)

This operation is used to get tuples/rows which are
in the first table but not in the second table and the
operation is represented by the symbol - (minus). Figure
9.6 shows minus operation (also called set difference)
between two sets.

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 Music Dance
NOTES

Figure 9.6: Difference of two sets

Suppose we want the list of students who are only

participating in MUSIC and not in DANCE event. Then,
we will use the MINUS operation, whose output is given
in Table 9.22.
Table 9.22 DANCE - MUSIC
+------+---------+-------------------+
| SNo | Name | Class |
+------+---------+-------------------+
|1 | Mehak | 8A |
|3 | Lavanya | 7A |
|5 | Abhay | 8A |
+------+---------+-------------------+

9.10.4 Cartesian Product (X)

Cartesian product operation combines tuples from
two relations. It results in all pairs of rows from the
two input relations, regardless of whether or not they
have the same values on common attributes. It is
denoted as ‘X’.
The degree of the resulting relation is calculated
as the sum of the degrees of both the relations under
consideration. The cardinality of the resulting relation is
calculated as the product of the cardinality of relations
on which cartesian product is applied. Let us use the
relations DANCE and MUSIC to show the output of
cartesian product. Note that both relations are of
degree
3. The cardinality of relations DANCE and MUSIC is 4
and 5 respectively. Applying cartesian product on these
two relations will result in a relation of degree 6 and
cardinality 20, as shown in Table 9.23.
Table 9.23 DANCE X MUSIC
+---+-------+-------+------+---------+------------------------------+
|SNo| Name | Class | SNo | Name | Class |
+---+-------+-------+------+---------+-----------------------------+
| 1 | Aastha | 7A | 1 | Mehak | 8A |
| 2 | Mahira | 6A | 1 | Mehak | 8A |
| 3 | Mohit | 7B | 1 | Mehak | 8A |
| 4 | Sanjay | 7A | 1 | Mehak | 8A |
| 1 | Aastha | 7A | 2 | Mahira | 6A |
| 2 | Mahira | 6A | 2 | Mahira | 6A |

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 NOTES | 3 | Mohit | 7B | 2 | Mahira | 6A |
| 4 | Sanjay | 7A | 2 | Mahira | 6A |
| 1 | Aastha | 7A | 3 | Lavanya | 7A |
| 2 | Mahira | 6A | 3 | Lavanya | 7A |
| 3 | Mohit | 7B | 3 | Lavanya | 7A |
| 4 | Sanjay | 7A | 3 | Lavanya | 7A |
| 1 | Aastha | 7A | 4 | Sanjay | 7A |
| 2 | Mahira | 6A | 4 | Sanjay | 7A |
| 3 | Mohit | 7B | 4 | Sanjay | 7A |
| 4 | Sanjay | 7A | 4 | Sanjay | 7A |
| 1 | Aastha | 7A | 5 | Abhay | 8A |
| 2 | Mahira | 6A | 5 | Abhay | 8A |
| 3 | Mohit | 7B | 5 | Abhay | 8A |
| 4 | Sanjay | 7A | 5 | Abhay | 8A |
+---+-------+-------+------+---------+-----------------------------+
20 rows in set (0.03 sec)

9.11 USING TWO RELATIONS IN A QUERY

Till now we have written queries in SQL using a single
relation only. In this section, we will learn to write
queries using two relations.
9.11.1 Cartesian product on two tables
From the previous section, we learnt that application
of operator cartesian product on two tables results
in a table having all combinations of tuples from the
underlying tables. When more than one table is to be
used in a query, then we must specify the table names
by separating commas in the FROM clause, as shown in
Example 9.24. On execution of such a query, the DBMS
(MySql) will first apply cartesian product on specified
tables to have a single table. The following query of
example 9.24 applies cartesian product on the two
tables DANCE and MUSIC:
Example 9.24
a) Display all possible combinations of tuples of
relations DANCE and MUSIC
mysql> SELECT * FROM DANCE, MUSIC;
As we are using SELECT * in the query, the
output will be the Table 9.23 having degree 6 and
cardinality 20.
b) From the all possible combinations of tuples of
relations DANCE and MUSIC display only those
rows such that the attribute name in both have the
same value.
mysql> SELECT * FROM DANCE D, MUSIC M WHERE
D.Name = M.Name;

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Table 9.24 Tuples with same name +-------+------+------------------
+------+--------+-------+------+--------+-------------------------------+
| Sno | Name | Class | Sno | Name | class |
+------+--------+-------+------+--------+-------------------------------+
| 2 | Mahira | 6A | 2 | Mahira | 6A |
| 4 | Sanjay | 7A | 4 | Sanjay | 7A |
+------+--------+-------+------+--------+-------------------------------+
2 rows in set (0.00 sec)
Note that in this query we have used table aliases (D
for DANCE and M for MUSIC), just like column aliases
(see Section 9.6.2) to refer to tables by shortened names.
It is important to note that table alias is valid only for
current query and the original table name cannot be
used in the query if its alias is given in FROM clause.
9.11.2 JOIN on two tables
JOIN operation combines tuples from two tables on
specified conditions. This is unlike cartesian product
which make all possible combinations of tuples. While
using the JOIN clause of SQL, we specify conditions on
the related attributes of two tables within the FROM
clause. Usually, such an attribute is the primary key
in one table and foreign key in another table. Let us
create two tables UNIFORM (UCode, UName, UColor)
and COST (UCode, Size, Price) in the SchoolUniform
database. UCode is Primary Key in table UNIFORM.
UCode and Size is the Composite Key in table COST.
Therefore, Ucode is a common attribute between the
two tables which can be used to fetch the common
data from both tables. Hence, we need to define Ucode
as foreign key in the Price table while creating this
table.
Table 9.25 Uniform table
+-------+-------+--------------------+
| Ucode | Uname | Ucolor |
+-------+-------+--------------------+
| 1 | Shirt | White |
| 2 | Pant | Grey |
| 3 | Tie | Blue |
+-------+-------+--------------------+

Table 9.26 Cost table

+-------+------+------------------+
| Ucode | Size | Price |
+-------+------+------------------+
| 1 |L | 580 |
| 1 |M | 500 |
| 2 |L | 890 |
| 2QUERY
| MLANGUAGE
| (SQL)810 |
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NOTES

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 NOTES Example 9.25 List the UCode, UName, UColor, Size and
Price of related tuples of tables UNIFORM and COST.
The given query may be written in three different
ways as given below.
a) Using condition in where clause
mysql> SELECT * FROM UNIFORM U, COST C WHERE
U.UCode = C.UCode;

Table 9.27 Output of the query

+-------+-------+--------+-------+-----+------------------------------+
| UCode | UName | UColor | Ucode |Size | Price |
+-------+-------+--------+-------+-----+------------------------------+
| 1 | Shirt | White | 1 | L | 580 |
| 1 | Shirt | White | 1 | M | 500 |
| 2 | Pant | Grey | 2 | L | 890 |
| 2 | Pant | Grey | 2 | M | 810 |
+-------+-------+--------+-------+-----+------------------------------+
4 rows in set (0.08 sec)
As the attribute Ucode is in both tables, we need
to use table alias to remove ambiguity. Hence, we
have used qualifier with attribute UCode in
SELECT and FROM clauses to indicate its scope.
b) Explicit use of JOIN clause
mysql> SELECT * FROM UNIFORM U JOIN COST C ON
U.Ucode=C.Ucode;
The output of the query is same as shown in
Table 9.26. In this query we have used JOIN clause
explicitly along with condition in From clause. Hence
no condition needs to be given in where clause.
c) Explicit use of NATURAL JOIN clause
The output of queries (a) and (b) shown in Table
9.26 has a repetitive column Ucode having exactly
the same values. This redundant column provides
no additional information. There is an extension of
JOIN operation called NATURAL JOIN which works
similar to JOIN clause in SQL but removes the
redundant attribute. This operator can be used to
join the contents of two tables if there is one common
attribute in both the tables. The above SQL query
using NATURAL JOIN is shown below:
mysql> SELECT * FROM UNIFORM NATURAL JOIN COST;
+-------+-------+--------+------+---------------------------+
| UCode | UName | UColor | Size | Price |
+-------+-------+--------+------+---------------------------+
| 1 | Shirt | White | L | 580 |
| 1 | Shirt | White | M | 500 |
| 2 | Pant | Grey | L | 890 |
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 | 2 | Pant | Grey |M | 810 |
+-------+-------+--------+------+---------------------------+ NOTES
4 rows in set (0.17 sec)
It is clear from the output that the result of this
query is same as that of queries written in (a) and (b)
except that the attribute Ucode appears only once.
Following are some of the points to be considered
while applying JOIN operations on two or more relations:
• If two tables are to be joined on equality condition
on the common attribute, then one may use JOIN
with ON clause or NATURAL JOIN in FROM clause.
If three tables are to be joined on equality
condition, then two JOIN or NATURAL JOIN are
required.
• In general, N-1 joins are needed to combine N tables
on equality condition.
• With JOIN clause, we may use any relational
operators to combine tuples of two tables.

SUMMARY
• Database is a collection of related tables. MySQL
is a ‘relational’ DBMS.
• DDL (Data Definition Language) includes SQL
statements such as, Create table, Alter table and
Drop table.
• DML (Data Manipulation Language) includes SQL
statements such as, insert, select, update and
delete.
• A table is a collection of rows and columns, where
each row is a record and columns describe the
feature of records.
• ALTER TABLE statement is used to make changes
in the structure of a table like adding, removing
or changing datatype of column(s).
• UPDATE statement is used to modify existing
data in a table.
• WHERE clause in SQL query is used to enforce
condition(s).
• DISTINCT clause is used to eliminate repetition
and display the values only once.

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 NOTES
• The BETWEEN operator defines the range of
values inclusive of boundary values.
• The IN operator selects values that match any
value in the given list of values.
• NULL values can be tested using IS NULL and IS
NOT NULL.
• ORDER BY clause is used to display the result of
a SQL query in ascending or descending order
with respect to specified attribute values. By
default, the order is ascending.
• LIKE operator is used for pattern matching. %
and _ are two wild card characters. The per cent
(%) symbol is used to represent zero or more
characters. The underscore (_) symbol is used to
represent a single character.
• A Function is used to perform a particular task
and return a value as a result.
• Single Row functions work on a single row of the
table and return a single value.
• Multiple Row functions work on a set of records
as a whole and return a single value. Examples
include COUNT, MAX, MIN, AVG and SUM.
• GROUP BY function is used to group rows of a
table that contain the same values in a specified
column.
• Join is an operation which is used to combine
rows from two or more tables based on one or
more common fields between them.

EXERCISE
1. Answer the following questions:
a) Define RDBMS. Name any two RDBMS software.
b) What is the purpose of the following clauses in a
select statement?
i) ORDER BY
ii) GROUP BY
c) Site any two differences between Single Row Functions
and Aggregate Functions.
d) What do you understand by Cartesian Product?
e) Differentiate between the following statements:

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 i) ALTER and UPDATE
ii) DELETE and DROP
f) Write the name of the functions to perform the
following operations:
i) To display the day like “Monday”, “Tuesday”,
from the date when India got independence.
ii) To display the specified number of characters
from a particular position of the given string.
iii) To display the name of the month in which
you were born.
iv) To display your name in capital letters.
2. Write the output produced by the following SQL
statements:
a) SELECT POW(2,3);
b) SELECT ROUND(342.9234,-1);
c) SELECT LENGTH("Informatics Practices");
d) SELECT YEAR(“1979/11/26”),
MONTH(“1979/11/26”), DAY(“1979/11/26”),
MONTHNAME(“1979/11/26”);
e) SELECT LEFT("INDIA",3), RIGHT("Computer
Science",4), MID("Informatics",3,4),
SUBSTR("Practices",3);

3. Consider the following MOVIE table and write the SQL

queries based on it.
MovieID MovieName Category ReleaseDate ProductionCost
BusinessCost
001 Hindi_Movie Musical 2018-04-23 124500 130000
002 Tamil_Movie Action 2016-05-17 112000 118000
003 English_Movie Horror 2017-08-06 245000 360000
004 Bengali_Movie Adventure 2017-01-04 72000 100000
005 Telugu_Movie Action - 100000 -
006 Punjabi_Movie Comedy - 30500 -

a) Display all the information from the Movie table.

b) List business done by the movies showing only
MovieID, MovieName and Total_Earning. Total_
Earning to be calculated as the sum of
ProductionCost and BusinessCost.
c) List the different categories of movies.
d) Find the net profit of each movie showing its
MovieID, MovieName and NetProfit. Net Profit is to be
calculated as the difference between Business Cost
and Production Cost.

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 e) List MovieID, MovieName and Cost for all movies with
ProductionCost greater than 10,000 and less than
1,00,000.
f) List details of all movies which fall in the category of
comedy or action.
g) List details of all movies which have not been released
yet.

4. Suppose your school management has decided to

conduct cricket matches between students of Class XI
and Class XII. Students of each class are asked to join
any one of the four teams – Team Titan, Team Rockers,
Team Magnet and Team Hurricane. During summer
vacations, various matches will be conducted between
these teams. Help your sports teacher to do the following:
a) Create a database “Sports”.
b) Create a table “TEAM” with following considerations:
i) It should have a column TeamID for storing an
integer value between 1 to 9, which refers to
unique identification of a team.
ii) Each TeamID should have its associated name
(TeamName), which should be a string of length
not less than 10 characters.
c) Using table level constraint, make TeamID as the
primary key.
d) Show the structure of the table TEAM using a SQL
statement.
e) As per the preferences of the students four teams
were formed as given below. Insert these four rows in
TEAM table:
Row 1: (1, Team Titan)
Row 2: (2, Team Rockers)
Row 3: (3, Team Magnet)
Row 3: (4, Team Hurricane)
f) Show the contents of the table TEAM using a DML
statement.
g) Now create another table MATCH_DETAILS and
insert data as shown below. Choose appropriate
data types and constraints for each attribute.
Table: MATCH_DETAILS
MatchID MatchDate FirstTeamID SecondTeamID FirstTeamScore SecondTeamScore
M1 2018-07-17 1 90 86
M2 2018-07-18 3 45 48
M3 2018-07-19 1 78 56
M4 2018-07-19 2 56 67
M5 2018-07-18 1 32 87
M6 2018-07-17 2 67 51
5. Using the sports database containing two relations
(TEAM, MATCH_DETAILS) and write the queries for the
following:

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 a) Display the MatchID of all those matches where both
the teams have scored more than 70.
NOTES
b) Display the MatchID of all those matches where
FirstTeam has scored less than 70 but SecondTeam
has scored more than 70.
c) Display the MatchID and date of matches played by
Team 1 and won by it.
d) Display the MatchID of matches played by Team 2
and not won by it.
e) Change the name of the relation TEAM to T_DATA.
Also change the attributes TeamID and TeamName
to T_ID and T_NAME respectively.

6. A shop called Wonderful Garments who sells school

uniforms maintains a database SCHOOLUNIFORM as
shown below. It consisted of two relations - UNIFORM
and COST. They made UniformCode as the primary key
for UNIFORM relations. Further, they used
UniformCode and Size to be composite keys for
COSTrelation. By analysing the database schema and
database state, specify SQL queries to rectify the
following anomalies.
a) M/S Wonderful Garments also keeps handkerchiefs
of red colour, medium size of Rs. 100 each.
b) INSERT INTO COST (UCode, Size, Price) values (7,
'M',100);
When the above query is used to insert data,
the values for the handkerchief without entering its
details in the UNIFORM relation is entered. Make
a provision so that the data can be entered in the
COST table only if it is already there in the UNIFORM
table.
c) Further, they should be able to assign a new UCode
to an item only if it has a valid UName. Write a query
to add appropriate constraints to the
SCHOOLUNIFORM database.
d) Add the constraint so that the price of an item is
always greater than zero.

7. Consider the following table named “Product”, showing

details of products being sold in a grocery shop.
PCode PName UPrice Manufacturer
P01 Washing Powder 120 Surf
P02 Toothpaste 54 Colgate
P03 Soap 25 Lux
P04 Toothpaste 65 Pepsodent
P05 Soap 38 Dove
P06 Shampoo 245 Dove

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 NOTES Write SQL queries for the following:
a) Create the table Product with appropriate data types
and constraints.
b) Identify the primary key in Product.
c) List the Product Code, Product name and price in
descending order of their product name. If PName is
the same, then display the data in ascending order
of price.
d) Add a new column Discount to the table Product.
e) Calculate the value of the discount in the table Product
as 10 per cent of the UPrice for all those products
where the UPrice is more than 100, otherwise the
discount will be 0.
f) Increase the price by 12 per cent for all the products
manufactured by Dove.
g) Display the total number of products manufactured
by each manufacturer.
Write the output(s) produced by executing the
following queries on the basis of the information
given above in the table Product:
h) SELECT PName, avg(UPrice) FROM Product GROUP
BY Pname;
i) SELECT DISTINCT Manufacturer FROM Product;
j) SELECT COUNT (DISTINCT PName) FROM Product;
k) SELECT PName, MAX(UPrice), MIN(UPrice) FROM
Product GROUP BY PName;

8. Using the CARSHOWROOM database given in the

chapter, write the SQL queries for the following:
a) Add a new column Discount in the INVENTORY table.
b) Set appropriate discount values for all cars keeping
in mind the following:
(i) No discount is available on the LXI model.
(ii) VXI model gives a 10 per cent discount.
(iii) A 12 per cent discount is given on cars other
than LXI model and VXI model.
c) Display the name of the costliest car with fuel type
“Petrol”.
d) Calculate the average discount and total discount
available on Baleno cars.
e) List the total number of cars having no discount.

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 h a pter
C
1 Computer
0 Networks

“Hoaxes use weaknesses in human

behavior to ensure they are replicated and
distributed. In other words, hoaxes prey on
the Human Operating System.”

— Stewart Kirkpatrick

In this Chapter
» Introduction to Computer
Networks
» Evolution of Networking
10.1 INTRODUCTION TO COMPUTER NETWORKS
» Types of Networks
» Network Devices We are living in a connected world. Information
is being produced, exchanged, and traced across
» Networking Topologies
the globe in real time. It's possible as almost
» Identifying Nodes everyone and everything in the digital world is
in a Networked interconnected through one way or the other.
Communication
» Internet, Web and the
Internet of Things
» Domain Name System

Figure 10.1: Interconnection forming a social network

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 Activity 10.1 A group of two or more similar things or people
Identify some other interconnected with each other is called network (Figure
networks in the 10.1). Some of the examples of network in our everyday
real world. life includes:
• Social network
• Mobile network
• Network of computers
• Airlines, railway, banks, hospitals networks
Acomputer network (Figure 10.2) is an interconnection
among two or more computers or computing devices.
Such interconnection allows computers to share data
and resources among each other. A basic network may
connect a few computers placed in a room.
The network size may vary from small to large
depending on the number of computers it connects.
A computer network can include different types of
hosts (also called nodes) like server, desktop, laptop,
cellular phones.

Networking
Device

Figure 10.2: A computer network

Apart from computers, networks include networking
devices like switch, router, modem, etc. Networking
devices are used to connect multiple computers in
different settings. For communication, data in a network
is divided into smaller chunks called packets. These
packets are then carried over a network. Devices in a
network can be connected either through wired media
like cables or wireless media like air.
In a communication network, each device that is a
part of a network and that can receive, create, store
or send data to different network routes is called a
node. In the context of data communication, a node
can be a device such as a modem, hub, bridge, switch,
router, digital telephone handset, a printer, a computer
or a server.

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 Interconnectivity of computing devices in a network Activity 10.2
allows us to exchange information simultaneously with
many parties through email, websites, audio/video Create a hotspot using
a smartphone and
calls, etc. Network allows sharing of resources. For connect other
example, a printer can be made available to multiple devices to it.
computers through a network; a networked storage
can be accessed by multiple computers. People often
connect their devices through hotspot, thus forming a
small personal network.

10.2 EVOLUTION OF NETWORKING

In the 1960s a research project was commissioned by
Advanced Research Projects Agency Network
(ARPANET) in the U.S. Department of Defence to
connect the academic and research institutions located
at different places for scientific collaborations. The first
message was communicated between the University of
California, Los Angeles (UCLA) and Stanford Research
Institute (SRI). Slowly but gradually, more and more
organisations joined the ARPANET, and many
independent smaller networks were formed. Few of
the milestones in the magnificent journey of evolution
of computer networks is depicted in the timeline
shown in Figure 10.3.
First version of Wi-fi
The idea of Advanced
Research Project Agency TCP/IP introduced as (802.11) standard was
Network (ARPANET) is standard protocol on introduced
conceptualized ARPANET National Science
Roy Tomlinson develops Foundation brings
network messaging or connectivity to more
E-mail. Symbol @ people with its NSFNET
comes to mean "at" program
1961 1997
1982
1971 1986

1969
1983
1990
ARPANET became 1974 Domain Name System
functional by introduced
connecting UCLA and
SRI
The term Internet was The Berners-Lee at
coined, CERN developed HTML
and URL, thus giving
First commercial use of birth to World Wide Web
ARPANET, was started (www)
in the name of Telenet

Figure 10.3: Timeline showing evolution of networking

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 NOTES 10.3 TYPES OF NETWORKS
There are various types of computer networks ranging
from network of handheld devices (like mobile phones
or tablets) connected through Wi-Fi or Bluetooth within
a single room to the millions of computers spread across
the globe. Some are connected wireless while others are
connected through wires.
Based on the geographical area covered and data
transfer rate, computer networks are broadly categorised
as:
• PAN ( Personal Area Network)
• LAN (Local Area Network)
• MAN (Metropolitan Area Network)
• WAN (Wide Area Network)

10.3.1 Personal Area Network (PAN)

It is a network formed by connecting a few personal
devices like computers, laptops, mobile phones, smart
phones, printers etc., as shown in Figure 10.4. All these
devices lie within an approximate range of 10 metres.
A personal area network may be wired or wireless.
For example, a mobile phone connected to the laptop
through USB forms a wired PAN while two
smartphones communicating with each other through
Bluetooth technology form a wireless PAN or WPAN.

Figure 10.4: A Personal Area Network

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10.3.2 Local Area Network (LAN)
It is a network that connects computers, mobile phones, Explore and find out
tablet, mouse, printer, etc., placed at a limited distance. the minimum internet
The geographical area covered by a LAN can range from speed required to
a single room, a floor, an office having one or more make a video call.
buildings in the same premise, laboratory, a school,
college, or university campus. The connectivity is done
by means of wires, Ethernet cables, fibre optics, or Wi-Fi.
A Local Area Network (LAN) is shown in Figure 10.5.

Figure 10.5: A Local Area Network

LAN is comparatively secure as only authentic

users in the network can access other computers or
shared resources. Users can print documents using
a connected printer, upload/download documents
and software to and from the local server. Such LANs
provide the short range communication with the high
speed data transfer rates. These types of networks can
be extended up to 1 km. Data transfer in LAN is quite
high, and usually varies from 10 Mbps (called Ethernet)
to 1000 Mbps (called Gigabit Ethernet), where Mbps
stands for Megabits per second. Ethernet is a set of rules
that decides how computers and other devices connect
with each other through cables in a local area network
or LAN.
10.3.3 Metropolitan Area Network (MAN)
Metropolitan Area Network (MAN) is an extended form
of LAN which covers a larger geographical area like a city
or a town. Data transfer rate in MAN also ranges in
Mbps,
COMPUTER NETWORKS 185
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 but it is considerably less as compared to LAN. Cable TV
network or cable based broadband internet services are
examples of MAN. This kind of network can be extended
up to 30-40 km. Sometimes, many LANs are connected
together to form MAN, as shown in Figure 10.6.

LAN 1

Networking LAN 3
Device

LAN 2

Figure 10.6: A Metropolitan Area Network

10.3.4 Wide Area Network (WAN)

Wide Area Network connects computers and other LANs
It is possible to access
and MANs, which are spread across different
your bank account geographical locations of a country or in different
from any part of the countries or continents. A WAN could be formed
world. Whether the by connecting a LAN to other LANs (Figure 10.7) via
bank’s network is a wired/wireless media. Large business, educational
LAN, MAN, WAN or
any other type?
and government organisations connect their different
branches in different locations across the world through
WAN. The Internet is the largest WAN that connects
billions of computers, smartphones and millions of
LANs from different continents.

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 Network User Network Network Network User
User User

Network Switch Network Switch

Network User Network User

Internet

Network User Network User Network User Network User

LAN 1 - Delhi LAN 1 - Shimla

Figure 10.7: A Wide Area Network

10.4 NETWORK DEVICES

To communicate data through different transmission
media and to configure networks with different
functionality, we require different devices like Modem,
Hub, Switch, Repeater, Router, Gateway, etc. Let us
explore them in detail.
10.4.1 Modem
Modem stands for ‘MOdulator DEModulator’. It refers
to a device used for conversion between analog signals
and digital bits. We know computers store and process
data in terms of 0s and 1s. However, to transmit data
from a sender to a receiver, or while browsing the
internet, digital data are converted to an analog signal
and the medium (be it free-space or a physical media)
carries the signal to the receiver. There are modems
connected to both the source and destination nodes.
The modem at the sender’s end acts as a modulator
that converts the digital data into analog signals. The
modem at the receiver’s end acts as a demodulator
that converts the analog signals into digital data for
the destination node to understand. Figure 10.8 shows
connectivity using a modem.

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 Analog Signal
Modulation Demodulation
Digital Signal
Digital Signal Demodulation Modulation

Telephone Line
Modem Modem

Figure 10.8: Use of modem

10.4.2 Ethernet Card
Ethernet card, also known as Network Interface Card
(NIC card in short) is a network adapter used to set
up a wired network.
It acts as an interface
between computer and
the network. It is a circuit
board mounted on the
motherboard of a computer
as shown in Figure
10.9. The Ethernet cable
connects the computer to
the network through NIC.
Ethernet cards can
support data transfer
between 10 Mbps and 1
Gbps (1000 Mbps). Each
NIC has a MAC address,
which helps in uniquely
identifying the computer
on the network.
Figure 10.9: A Network Interface Card

10.4.3 RJ45
RJ 45 or Registered Jack-45 is an
eight-pin connector (Figure 10.10)
that is used exclusively with
Ethernet cables for networking.
It is a standard networking
interface that can be seen at
the end of all network cables.
Basically, it is a small plastic plug
that fits into RJ-45 jacks of the
Ethernet cards present in various
Figure 10.10: RJ 45
computing devices.

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10.4.4 Repeater
Data are carried in the form of signals over the cable.
These signals can travel a specified distance (usually
about 100 m). Signals lose their strength beyond this
limit and become weak. In such conditions, original An Internet service
signals need to be regenerated. provider (ISP) is any
A repeater is an analog device that works with signals organisation that
on the cables to which it is connected. The weakened provides services
signal appearing on the cable is regenerated and put for accessing the
Internet.
back on the cable by a repeater.
10.4.5 Hub
An Ethernet hub (Figure 10.11) is a network device used
to connect different devices through wires. Data arriving
on any of the lines are sent out on all the others. The
limitation of Hub is that if data from two devices come
at the same time, they will collide.
Activity 10.3
Find and list a
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 few ISPs in your
region.

Figure 10.11: A network hub with 8 ports

10.4.5 Switch
A switch is a networking device (Figure 10.12) that
plays a central role in a Local Area Network (LAN).
Like a hub, a network switch is used to connect
multiple computers or communicating devices. When
data arrives, the switch extracts the
destination address from the data
packet and looks it up in a table to
see where to send the packet.
Thus, it sends signals to only
selected devices instead of
sending to all. It can forward
multiple packets at the same time.
A switch does not forward the
signals which are noisy or
corrupted. It drops such signals
and asks the sender to resend it. Figure 10.12: Cables connected to a network switch

Ethernet switches are common in homes/offices

to connect multiple devices thus creating LANs or to
access the Internet.

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 NOTES 10.4.6 Router
A router (Figure 10.13) is a network device that can
receive the data, analyse it and transmit it to other
networks. A router connects a local area network to
the internet. Compared to a hub or a switch, a router
has advanced capabilities as it can analyse the data
being carried over a network, decide/alter how it is
packaged, and send it to another network of a different
type. For example, data has been divided into packets
of a certain size. Suppose these packets are to be
carried over a different type of network which cannot
handle bigger packets. In such a case, the data is to
be repackaged as smaller packets and then sent over
the network by a router.

Figure 10.13: A router

A router can be wired or wireless. A wireless router
can provide Wi-Fi access to smartphones and other
devices. Usually, such routers also contain some ports
to provide wired Internet access. These days, home Wi-Fi
routers perform the dual task of a router and a modem/
switch. These routers connect to incoming broadband
lines, from ISP (Internet Service Provider), and convert
them to digital data for computing devices to process.
10.4.7 Gateway
As the term “Gateway” suggests, it is a key access point
that acts as a “gate” between an organisation's network
and the outside world of the Internet (Figure 10.14).
Gateway serves as the entry and exit point of a network,
as all data coming in or going out of a network must
first pass through the gateway in order to use routing
paths. Besides routing data packets, gateways also
maintain information about the host network's internal
connection paths and the identified paths of other
remote networks. If a node from one network wants to
communicate with a node of a foreign network, it will

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pass the data packet to the gateway, which then routes
it to the destination using the best possible route.

10.0.0.0/8 Server GATEWAY Server 20.0.0.0/8

IP ADDRESS IP ADDRESS

PC 4 PC 5 PC 4 PC 5

PC 1 PC 2 PC 3 PC 1 PC 2 PC 3

Figure 10.14: A network gateway

For simple Internet connectivity at homes, the

gateway is usually the Internet Service Provider that
provides access to the entire Internet. Generally, a
router is configured to work as a gateway device
in computer networks. But a gateway can be
implemented completely in software, hardware, or
a combination of both. Because a network gateway
is placed at the edge of a network, the firewall is
usually integrated with it.

10.5 NETWORKING TOPOLOGIES

We have already discussed that a number of computing
devices are connected together to form a Local Area
Network (LAN), and interconnections among millions of
LANs forms the Internet. The arrangement of computers
and other peripherals in a network is called its topology.
Common network topologies are Mesh, Ring, Bus, Star
and Tree.

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 10.5.1 Mesh Topology
In this networking topology, each communicating
device is connected with every other device in the
network as shown in Figure 10.15. Such a network can
handle large amounts of traffic since multiple nodes
can transmit data simultaneously. Also, such networks
are more reliable in the sense that even if a node gets
down, it does not cause any break in the transmission
of data between other nodes. This topology is also
more secure as compared to other topologies because
each cable between two nodes carries different data.
However, wiring is complex and cabling cost is high in
creating such networks and there are many redundant
or unutilised connections.

Figure 10.15: A mesh topology

To build a fully-
connected mesh 10.5.2 Ring Topology
topology of n nodes,
it requires n(n-1)/2 In ring topology (Figure 10.16), each node is connected
wires. to two other devices, one each on either side, as shown
in Figure 10.16. The nodes connected with each
other thus forms a ring. The link in a ring topology is
unidirectional. Thus, data can be transmitted in one
direction only (clockwise or counterclockwise).

Figure 10.16: A ring topology

10.5.3 Bus Topology

In bus topology (Figure 10.17), each communicating
device connects to a transmission medium, known as
bus. Data sent from a node are passed on to the bus
and hence are transmitted to the length of the bus in
both directions. That means, data can be received by
any of the nodes connected to the bus.

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 Bus

Figure 10.17: A bus topology

In this topology, a single backbone wire called bus is
shared among the nodes, which makes it cheaper and
easier to maintain. Both ring and bus topologies are
considered to be less secure and less reliable.
10.5.4 Star Topology
In star topology (Figure 10.18), each communicating
How will a Bus and
device is connected to a central node, which is a Ring topology behave
networking device like a hub or a switch, as shown in in case a Node is
Figure 10.18. down?
Star topology is considered very effective, efficient
and fast as each device is directly connected with the
central device. Although disturbance in one device will
not affect the rest of the network, any failure in a central
networking device may lead to the failure of complete
network.

Figure 10.18: A star topology

The central node can be either a broadcasting

device means data will be transmitted to all the nodes
in the network, or a unicast device means the node can
identify the destination and forward data to that node
only.
10.5.5 Tree or Hybrid Topology
It is a hierarchical topology, in which there are
multiple branches and each branch can have one or
more basic topologies like star, ring and bus. Such
topologies are usually realised in WANs where
multiple LANs are connected. Those LANs may be in
the form of a ring, bus or star. In figure 10.19, a hybrid
topology is shown connecting 4-star topologies in a
bus.
In this type of network, data transmitted from source
first reaches the centralised device and from there the
data passes through every branch where each branch
can have links for more nodes.
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 Figure 10.19: A hybrid topology

10.6 IDENTIFYING NODES IN A NETWORKED

COMMUNICATION
Each node in a network should be uniquely identified
so that a network device can identify the sender and
receiver and decide a routing path to transmit data.
Let us explore further and know how each node is
distinguished in a network.
10.6.1 MAC Address
MAC stands for Media Access Control. The MAC
address, also known as the physical or hardware
address, is a unique value associated with a network
adapter called a NIC. The MAC address is engraved on
NIC at the time of manufacturing and thus it is a
permanent address and cannot be changed under any
circumstances. The machine on which the NIC is
attached, can be physically identified on the network
using its MAC address.
Each MAC address is a 12-digit hexadecimal numbers
(48 bits in length), of which the first six digits (24 bits)
contain the manufacturer’s ID called Organisational
Unique Identifier (OUI) and the later six digits (24 bits)
represents the serial number assigned to the card by
the manufacturer. A sample MAC address looks like:

Activity 10.4
Explore how can you
find the MAC 10.6.2 IP Address
address of your
computer
IP address, also known as Internet Protocol address,
system. is also a unique address that can be used to uniquely
identify each node in a network. The IP addresses

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are assigned to each node in a network that uses the
Internet Protocol for communication. Thus, if we know Do mobile phones
a computer’s IP address, we can communicate with have a MAC address?
that computer from anywhere in the world. However, Is it different from
unlike MAC address, IP address can change if a node the IMEI number of
mobile phones?
is removed from one network and connected to
another network.
The initial IP Address called version 4 (IPV4 in short),
is a 32 bit numeric address, written as four numbers
separated by periods, where each number is the decimal
(base-10) representation for an 8-bit binary (base-2)
number and each can take any value from 0 - 255. A
sample IPV4 address looks like:
192.168.0.178
With more and more devices getting connected to
the Internet, it was realised that the 32-bit IP address
will not be sufficient as it offers just under 4.3 billion
unique addresses. Thus, a 128 bits IP address, called IP
version 6 (IPV6 in short) was proposed. An IPv6 address
is represented by eight groups of hexadecimal (base-16)
numbers separated by colons. A sample IPV6 address
looks like:
2001:CDBA:0000:0000:0000:0000:3257:9652

10.7 INTERNET, WEB AND THE INTERNET OF THINGS

The Internet is the global network of computing
devices including desktop, laptop, servers, tablets,
mobile phones, other handheld devices, printers,
scanners, routers, switches, gateways, etc. Moreover,
smart electronic appliances like TV, AC, refrigerator,
fan, light, etc. can also communicate through a
network. The list of such smart devices is always
increasing e.g., drones, vehicles, door lock, security
camera. We have already studied IoT and WoT in class
11.
The Internet is evolving every day and it is difficult
to visualise or describe each and every aspect of the
architecture of the Internet. Computers are either
connected to a modem through a cable or wirelessly (Wi-
Fi). That modem, be it wired or wireless, is connected to
a local Internet Service Provider (ISP) who then connects
to a national network. Many such ISPs connect together
forming a regional network and regional networks
connect together forming a national network, and such
country-wise networks form the Internet backbone.

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 The Internet today is a widespread network, and its
influence is no longer limited to the technical fields of
computer communications. It is being used by
everyone in the society as is evident from the
increasing use of online tools for education, creativity,
You are encouraged entertainment, socialisation, and e-commerce.
to take up any area
of concern where 10.7.1 The World Wide Web (WWW)
you think IoT can be The World Wide Web (WWW) or web in short, is an
immensely beneficial
ocean of information, stored in the form of trillions
and discuss it with
your peers. An of interlinked web pages and web resources. The
example for the same resources on the web can be shared or accessed
can be preventing through the Internet.
road accidents.
Earlier, to access files residing in different
computers, one had to login individually to each
computer through the Internet. Besides, files in
different computers were sometimes in different
formats, and it was difficult to understand each other’s
files and documents. Sir Tim Berners-Lee — a British
computer scientist invented the revolutionary World
Wide Web in 1990 by defining three fundamental
technologies that lead to creation of web:
• HTML – HyperText Markup Language. It is a language
which is used to design standardised Web Pages so
that the Web contents can be read and understood
from any computer. Basic structure of every webpage
is designed using HTML.
• URI – Uniform Resource Identifier. It is a unique
address or path for each resource located on the
web. It is also known as Uniform Resource Locator
(URL). Every page on the web has a unique URL.
Examples are: https://www.mhrd.gov.in,http://
www.ncert.nic.in,http://www.airindia.in, etc. URL
is sometimes also called web address. However,
a URL is not only the domain name. It contains
other information that completes a web address,
as depicted below:
Domain Name

http://www.ncert.nic.in/textbook/textbook.htm
URL

• HTTP – The HyperText Transfer Protocol is a set of

rules which is used to retrieve linked web pages
across the web. The more secure and advanced
version is HTTPS.

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 Many people confuse the web with the Internet.
NOTES
The Internet as we know is the huge global network
of interconnected computers, which may or may not
have any file or webpage to share with the world. The
web on the other hand is the interlinking of collection
of Webpages on these computers which are accessible
over the Internet. WWW today gives users access to a
vast collection of information created and shared by
people across the world. It is today the most popular
information retrieval system

10.8 DOMAIN NAME SYSTEM

The Internet is a vast ocean where information is available
in the form of millions of websites. Each website is stored
on a server which is connected to the Internet, which
means each server has an IP address. Every device
connected to the Internet has an IP address. To access a
website, we need to enter its IP address on our web
browser. But it is very difficult to remember the IP
addresses of different websites as they are in terms of
numbers or strings.
However, it is easier to remember names, and
therefore, each computer server hosting a website or
web resource is given a name against its IP address.
These names are called the Domain names or hostnames
corresponding to unique IP addresses assigned to each
server. For easy understanding, it can be considered
as the phonebook where instead of remembering each
person’s phone number, we assign names to their
numbers. For example, IP addresses and domain names
of some websites are as follows:
Table 10.1 Examples of domain names and their
mapped IP addresses
Domain Name IP Address
ncert.nic.in 164.100.60.233
cbse.nic.in 164.100.107.32
mhrd.gov.in 164.100.163.45

wikipedia.org 198.35.26.96

10.8.1 DNS Server

Instead of remembering IP addresses, we assign a domain
name to each IP. But, to access a web resource, a
browser needs to find out the IP address corresponding
to the domain name entered. Conversion of the domain

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 name of each web server to its corresponding IP address
is called domain name resolution. It is done through
a server called DNS server. Thus, when we enter a
URL on a web browser, the HTTP protocol approaches
a computer server called DNS server to obtain the IP
address corresponding to that domain name. After
getting the IP address, the HTTP protocol retrieves the
information and loads it in our browser.
In Figure 10.20, an example is shown in which the
HTTP requests a DNS server for corresponding IP addss,
and the server sends back an IP address.
DNS root servers
User
are named using
alphabets A through
M for the first
13 letters of the
alphabet. Ten of 164.100.60.233
these servers are HTTP in DNS
Browser www.ncert.nic.in Server
in the US, one in
London, one in
Stockholm, and
one in Japan.
The organisation
Figure 10.20: Request of IP address corresponding to domain name
Internet Assigned
Numbers Authority
A DNS server maintains a database of domain names
(IANA) keeps this
list of DNS root and their corresponding IP addresses. To understand
servers. how the domain name resolution works, we have to
understand how and where the DNS servers are kept.
The DNS servers are placed in hierarchical order. At
the top level, there are 13 servers called root servers.
Then below the root servers there are other DNS servers
at different levels. A DNS server may contain the IP
address corresponding to a domain or it will contain
the IP address of other DNS servers, where this domain
entry can be searched.

SUMMARY
• A computer network is an interconnection among
two or more computers or computing devices.
• A computer network allows computers to share
data and resources among each other.
• Networking devices are used to connect multiple
computers in different settings.

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 NOTES
• In a communication network, each device that is
a part of a network and that can receive, create,
store or send data to different network routes is
called a node.
• Based on the geographical area covered and data
transfer rate, computer networks are broadly
categorised into LAN (Local Area Network), MAN
(Metropolitan Area Network) and WAN (Wide
Area Network).
• LAN is a network that connects a variety of
nodes placed at a limited distance ranging from
a single room, a floor, an office or a campus
having one or more buildings in the same
premises.
• Ethernet is a set of rules that decides how
computers and other devices connect with each
other through cables in a LAN.
• Metropolitan Area Network (MAN) is an extended
form of LAN which covers a larger geographical
area like a city or a town.
• Cable TV network or cable based broadband
internet services are examples of MAN.
• Wide Area Network (WAN) connects computers
and other LANs and MANs, which are spread
across different geographical locations of a
country or in different countries or continents.
• The Internet is the largest WAN that connects
billions of computers, smartphones and millions
of LANs from different continents.
• Modem stands for ‘MOdulator DEModulator’,
is a device used for conversion between electric
signals and digital bits.
• Ethernet card, also known as Network Interface
Card (NIC card in short) is a network adaptor
used to set up a wired network.
• Each NIC has a MAC address, which helps in
uniquely identifying the computer on the network.
• A repeater is an analog device that regenerate the
signals on the cables to which it is connected.
• A switch is a networking device used to connect
multiple computers or communicating devices.
• A router is a network device that can receive the
data, analyse it and transmit it to other networks.

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 NOTES
• Gateway serves as the entry and exit point of a
network, as all data coming in or going out of a
network must first pass through the gateway in
order to use routing paths.
• The arrangement of computers and other
peripherals in a network is called its topology.
• Common network topologies are Mesh, Ring,
Bus, Star and Tree.
• In mesh topology each communicating device is
connected with every other device in the network.
• In ring topology, each node is connected to two
other devices, one each on either side.
• In bus topology, a single backbone wire called
bus is shared among the nodes, which makes it
cheaper and easy to maintain.
• In star topology, each communicating device is
connected to a central networking device like a
hub or a switch.
• In tree or hybrid topology, there are multiple
branches and each branch can have one or more
basic topologies like star, ring and bus.
• The MAC address, also known as the physical or
hardware address, is a unique permanent value
associated with a network adapter called a NIC.
It is used to physically identify a machine on the
network.
• IP address, also known as Internet Protocol
address, is a unique address that can be used to
uniquely identify each node in a network.
• Unlike MAC address, IP address can change if a
node is removed from one network and connected
to another network.
• The Internet is the global network of computing
devices.
• The World Wide Web (WWW) or web in short, is
an ocean of information, stored in the form of
trillions of interlinked web pages and web
resources.
• Sir Tim Berners-Lee — a British computer
scientist invented the revolutionary World Wide
Web in 1990.
• HTML (HyperText Markup Language) is a
language which is used to design standardised
Web Pages so that the Web contents can be read

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 and understood from any computer. NOTES
• URI (Uniform Resource Identifier) or URL (Uniform
Resource Locator) is a unique address or path for
each resource located on the web.
• HTTP – The HyperText Transfer Protocol is a set of
rules which is used to retrieve linked web pages
across the web. The more secure and advanced
version is HTTPS.
• Each computer server hosting a website or web
resource is given a name against its IP address.
These names are called the Domain names or
hostnames.
• Conversion of the domain name of each web server
to its corresponding IP address is called domain
name resolution. It is done through a server called
DNS server.

EXERCISE
1. Expand the following:
a) ARPANET
b) MAC
c) ISP
d) URI
2. What do you understand by the term network?
3. Mention any two main advantages of using a network of
computing devices.
4. Differentiate between LAN and WAN.
5. Write down the names of few commonly used networking
devices.
6. Two universities in different States want to transfer
information. Which type of network they need to use for
this?
7. Define the term topology. What are the popular network
topologies?
8. How is tree topology different from bus topology?
9. Identify the type of topology from the following:
a) Each node is connected with the help of a single cable.
b) Each node is connected with central switching
through independent cables.

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 NOTES 10. What do you mean by a modem? Why is it used?
11. Explain the following devices:
a) Switch
b) Repeater
c) Router
d) Gateway
e) NIC
12. Draw a network layout of star topology and bus
topology connecting five computers.
13. What is the significance of MAC address?
14. How is IP address different from MAC address?
Discuss briefly.
15. What is DNS? What is a DNS server?
16. Sahil, a class X student, has just started understanding
the basics of Internet and web technologies. He is a
bit confused in between the terms “World Wide Web”
and “Internet”. Help him in understanding both the
terms with the help of suitable examples of each.

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 h a pter
C
11 Data
Communication
“People already have bionic arms and legs that
work by the power of thought. And we increasingly
outsource mental and communicative activities to
computers. We are merging with our smartphones.
Very soon, they will just be part of the body”

— Yuval Noah Harari

In this Chapter
» Concept of Communication
» Components of Data
Communication 11.1 CONCEPT OF COMMUNICATION
» Measuring Capacity of
Communication Media
The term “Data Communication” comprises two
words: Data and Communication. Data can be
» Types of Data any text, image, audio, video, and multimedia
Communication
files. Communication is an act of sending or
» Switching Techniques receiving data. Thus, data communication refers
» Transmission Media to the exchange of data between two or more
» Mobile Telecommunication networked or connected devices. These devices
Technologies must be capable of sending and receiving data
» Protocol over a communication medium. Examples of
such devices include personal computers, mobile
phones, laptops, etc. As we can see in Figure
11.1, four different types of devices — computer,
printer, server and switch are connected to form
the network. These devices are connected through
a media to the network, which carry information
from one end to other end.

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 Central Server
Sharing Printer
connected to Switch

Switch

Figure 11.1: A simple network of computing devices

11.2 COMPONENTS OF DATA COMMUNICATION

Whenever we talk about communication between
two computing devices using a network, five most
important aspects come to our mind. These are sender,
receiver, communication medium, the message to be
communicated, and certain rules called protocols to be
followed during communication. The communication
media is also called transmission media. Figure
11.2 shows the role of these five components in data
communication.

Sender

Activity 11.1 Transmission

Receiver
Media
List various types
Figure 11.2: Components of data communication
of senders on a
network. Sender: A sender is a computer or any such device
which is capable of sending data over a network. It
can be a computer, mobile phone, smartwatch, walkie-
talkie, video recording device, etc.
Receiver: A receiver is a computer or any such device
which is capable of receiving data from the network.
It can be any computer, printer, laptop, mobile phone,
television, etc. In computer communication, the sender
and receiver are known as nodes in a network.

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Message: It is the data or information that needs to 1 Gbps=230
be exchanged between the sender and the receiver. bps=1024
Messages can be in the form of text, number, image, Mbps
audio, video, multimedia, etc. 1 Tbps=240
bps=1024
Communication media: It is the path through which Gbps
the message travels between source and destination.
It is also called medium or link which is either wired
or wireless. For example, a television cable, telephone
cable, ethernet cable, satellite link, microwaves, etc.
We will study about various communication media in
section 11.5.
Protocols: It is a set of rules that need to be followed
by the communicating parties in order to have
successful and reliable data communication. You have
already come across protocols such as Ethernet and
HTTP.

11.3 MEASURING CAPACITY OF COMMUNICATION

MEDIA
In data communication, the transmission medium is
also known as channel. The capacity of a channel is the
maximum amount of signals or traffic that a channel
can carry. It is measured in terms of bandwidth and
data transfer rate as described below:
11.3.1 Bandwidth
Bandwidth of a channel is the range of frequencies
available for transmission of data through that
channel. Higher the bandwidth, higher the data
transfer rate. Normally, bandwidth is the difference of
maximum and minimum frequency contained in the
composite signals. Bandwidth is measured in Hertz
(Hz).
1 KHz =1000 Hz
1 MHz =1000 KHz = 1000000 Hz
11.3.2 Data Transfer Rate
Data travels in the form of signals over a channel. One
signal carries one or more bits over the channel. Data
transfer rate is the number of bits transmitted
between source and destination in one second. It is
also known as bit rate. It is measured in terms of bits
per second (bps). The higher units for data transfer
rates are:
1 Kbps=210 bps=1024 bps
1 Mbps=220 bps=1024 Kbps
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 Activity 11.2
Find out how
many hertz is
10 Megahertz.
MBps stands for Megabyte per second whereas Mbps
stands
for Megabit per
second.

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 NOTES Example 11.1 A user wants to upload a text document at
the rate of 10 pages per 20 second. What will be the
required data rate of the channel? (Assume that 1 page
contains 1600 characters and each character is of 8 bits).

Solution:

11.4 TYPES OF DATA COMMUNICATION

Data communication happens in the form of signals
between two or more computing devices or nodes.
The transfer of data happens over a point-to-point
or multipoint communication channel. Data
communication between different devices are broadly
categorised into 3 types: Simplex communication, Half-
duplex communication, and Full-duplex communication.
11.4.1 Simplex Communication
It is a one way or unidirectional communication between
two devices in which one device is sender and other
one is receiver. Devices use the entire capacity of the
link to transmit the data. It is like a one way street
where vehicles can move in only one direction. For
example, data entered through a keyboard or audio
sent to a speaker are one way communications.
With the advent of IoT, controlling home appliances
is another example of simplex communication as
shown in the Figure 11.3. One can control fans, lights,
fridge, oven etc. while sitting in the office or driving a
car.

Simplex One Direction

Figure 11.3: Simplex communication

11.4.2 Half-duplex Communication

It is two way or bidirectional communication between
two devices in which both the devices can send and
receive data or control signals in both directions, but
not at the same time, as shown in Figure 11.4. While
one device is sending data, the other one will receive and
vice-versa. It is like sharing a one-way narrow bridge
among vehicles
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moving in both directions. Vehicles cannot pass the
NOTES
bridge simultaneously. Basically, it is a simplex
channel where the direction of transmission can be
switched. Application of such type of communication
can be found in walkie-talkie where one can press the
push-to-talk button and talk. This enables the
transmitter and turns off the receiver in that device
and others can only listen.

OR

Figure 11.4: Half-duplex where communication occurs in two

different moments.

11.4.3 Full-duplex Communication

It is two way or bidirectional communication in which
both devices can send and receive data
simultaneously, as shown in Figure 11.5. It is like a two
way road where vehicles can go in both directions at
the same time. This type of communication channel is
employed to allow simultaneous communication, for
example, in our mobile phones and landline
telephones. The capacity of the transmission link is
shared between the signals going in both directions.
This can be done either by using two physically
separate simplex lines — one for sending and other for
receiving, or the capacity of the single channel is
shared between the signals travelling in different
directions.

Both Directions

A B
Figure 11.5: Full duplex transmission of data

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 11.5 SWITCHING TECHNIQUES
VoIP is a In a network having multiple devices, we are
communication interested to know how to connect the sender and
methodology receiver so that one-to-one communication is possible.
designed to One solution is to make a dedicated connection
deliver both voice
and multimedia
between each pair of devices (mesh topology) or
communications between a central device and every other device (a star
over Internet topology). However, we know that such methods are
protocol. costly in case of large networks.
An alternative to this is switching whereby data
is routed through various nodes in a network. This
switching process forms a temporary route for the
data to be transmitted. Two commonly used switching
techniques are — Circuit Switching and Packet
Switching.

Voice over Long- 11.5.1 Circuit Switching

Term Evolution In circuit switching, before a communication starts,
(VoLTE) is a a dedicated path is identified between the sender and
standard for high-
speed wireless the receiver. This path is a connected sequence of links
communication between network nodes. All packets follow the same
for mobile phones, path established during the connection.
including IoT and
In earlier days, when we placed a telephone call, the
switching equipment within the telephone system
wearables.
finds out a physical path or channel all the way from
our telephone at home to the receiver’s telephone. This
is an example of circuit switching.
11.5.2 Packet Switching
In packet switching, each information or message to
be transmitted between sender and receiver is broken
down into smaller pieces, called packets. These packets
are then transmitted independently through the
network. Different packets of the same message may
take different routes depending on availability.
Each packet has two parts — a header containing
the address of the destination and other information,
and the main message part. When all the packets reach
the destination, they are reassembled and the
complete message is received by the receiver.
Unlike circuit switching, a channel is occupied
in packet switching only during the transmission of
the packet. On completion of the transmission, the
channel is available for transfer of packets from other
communicating parties.

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11.6 TRANSMISSION MEDIA NOTES
A transmission medium can be anything that can
carry signals or data between the source (transmitter)
and destination (receiver). For example, as we switch
on a ceiling fan or a light bulb, the electric wire is the
medium that carries electric current from switch to
the fan or bulb. Two men are talking as shown in
Figure
11.6. Here the medium is air.

Figure 11.6: Two person communicating

In data communication, transmission media

are the links that carry messages between two or
more communicating devices. Transmission can be
classified as guided or unguided. Figure 11.7 shows the
classification of communication media.
In guided transmission, there is a physical link
made of wire/cable through which data in terms of
signals are propagated between the nodes. These are
usually metallic cable, fiber-optic cable, etc. They are
also known as wired media.
In unguided transmission, data travels in air in
terms of electromagnetic waves using an antenna. They
are also known as wireless media.

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 Communication
Media

Wired Wireless Media

(Electromagnetic
Media
waves)

Twisted Pair Fiber-Optic

Co-axial Cable Radio Waves Micro Waves Infrared Waves
Cable Cable

Figure 11.7: Classification of communication media

Dish-shaped antennas are used for sending and

receiving data at longer distances. These antennas are
mounted on taller buildings so that it would be in line-of-
sight. Waves gradually become weaker and weaker after
travelling a certain distance through the air. Therefore
repeaters are installed to regenerate the signals of the
same energy.
11.6.1 Wired Transmission Media
Any physical link that can carry data in the form of
signals belongs to the category of wired transmission
media. Three commonly used guided/wired media for
data transmission are, twisted pair, coaxial cable, and
fiber optic cable. Twisted-pair and coaxial cable carry
the electric signals whereas the optical fiber cable
carries the light signals.
(A) Twisted Pair Cable
A twisted-pair consists of two copper wires twisted like
a DNA helical structure. Both the copper wires are
insulated with plastic covers. Usually, a number of
such pairs are combined together and covered with a
protective outer wrapping, as shown in Figure 11.8.
Twisted Pair of Cables

Figure 11.8: Twisted pair of cables

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 Each of the twisted pairs act as a single
communication link. The use of twisted configuration
minimises the effect of electrical interference from
similar pairs close by. Twisted pairs are less expensive
and most commonly used in telephone lines and LANs.
These cables are of two types: Unshielded twisted-pair
(UTP) and Shielded twisted-pair (STP), as shown in
Figure 11.9.
Metal Shield
Metal Shield

(a) UTP (b)

(b) STP
STP

Plastic Cover Plastic Cover

Figure 11.9: UTP Cable and STP Cable

(B) Coaxial cable
Backbone networks
Coaxial cable is another type of data transmission interconnect different
medium. It is better shielded and has more bandwidth segments of the
than a twisted pair. As shown in Figure 11.10, it has a network and provide
copper wire at the core of the cable which is surrounded a path to exchange
information between
with insulating material. The insulator is further
different LANs or
surrounded with an outer conductor (usually a copper subnetworks..
mesh). This outer conductor is wrapped in a plastic
cover. The key to success of coaxial cable is its shielded
design that allows the cable's copper core to transmit
data quickly, without interference of environmental
factors. These types of cables are used to carry signals
of higher frequencies to a longer distance.
Braided
outer Conductor
Copper
Core

Protective
Plastic Covering Insulating
Material

Figure 11.10: A coaxial cable

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 (C) Optical Fibre
The optical fiber cable carries data as light, which travels
The number of
oscillations a inside a thin fiber of glass (Figure 11.11). Optic fiber
wave makes per uses refraction to direct the light through the media. A
second is called its thin transparent strand of glass at the centre is covered
frequency, and it with a layer of less dense glass called cladding. This
is measured in Hz whole arrangement is covered with an outer jacket made
(Hertz).
of PVC or Teflon. Such types of cables are usually used
in backbone networks. These cables are of light weight
and have higher bandwidth which means higher data
transfer rate. Signals can travel longer distances and
electromagnetic noise cannot affect the cable. However,
optic fibers are expensive and unidirectional. Two cables
are required for full duplex communication.

Glass

Sender Receiver

Cladding of less
dense material
Figure 11.11: Fiber optic cable

Geostationary
satellites orbiting 11.6.2 Wireless Transmission Media
around the Earth In wireless communication technology, information
are used to
deliver broadband
In wireless communication technology, information
Internet service, travels in the form of electromagnetic signals through
similar to the way air. Electromagnetic spectrum of frequency ranging
satellite is used from 3 KHz to 900 THz is available for wireless
for television and communication (Figure 11.12). Wireless technologies
telephone signals.
allow communication between two or more devices in
These satellites
use microwaves short to long distance without requiring any physical
for communication media. There are many types of wireless communication
between a satellite technologies such as Bluetooth, WiFi, WiMax etc.
dish placed at our
home and the hub The electromagnetic spectrum range (3KHz to
of satellite internet 900THz) can be divided into 4 categories (Figure 11.12) -
service providers. Radio waves, Microwaves, Infrared waves and Visible or
Light waves, according to their frequency ranges. Some

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of the properties of each wave are listed in Table 11.1.
of these, three are useful for wireless communication.
3
1 300 400 900
KHz
GHz GHz THz THz

Radio
Microwaves Infrared Light
Waves
Waves Waves
Figure 11.12: Electromagnetic waves spectrum
Table 11.1 Classification of transmission waves and their properties
Transmission
Properties
Waves
Radio Waves 1. Waves of frequency range 3 KHz - 1 GHz
2. Omni-directional, these waves can move in all directions
3. Radio waves of frequency 300KHz-30MHz can travel long distance
4. Susceptible to interference
5. Radio waves of frequency 3-300KHz can penetrate walls
6. These waves are used in AM and FM radio, television, cordless phones.

Microwaves 1. Electromagnetic waves of frequency range 1GHz - 300GHz.

2. Unidirectional, can move in only one direction.
3. Cannot penetrate solid objects such as walls, hills or mountains.
4. Needs line-of-sight propagation i.e. both communicating antenna must
be in the direction of each other.
5. Used in point-to-point communication or unicast communication such
as radar and satellite.
6. Provide very large information-carrying capacity.

Infrared waves 1. Electromagnetic waves of frequency range 300GHz - 400THz.

2. Very high frequency waves.
3. Cannot penetrate solid objects such as walls.
4. Used for short-distance point-to-point communication such as mobile-
to-mobile, mobile-to-printer, remote-control-to-TV, and Bluetooth-
enabled devices to other devices like mouse, keyboards etc.

11.6.3 Wireless Technologies

(A) Bluetooth
Bluetooth is a short-range wireless technology that can
be used to connect mobile-phones, mouse,
headphones, keyboards, computers, etc. wirelessly
over a short distance. One can print documents
with bluetooth-
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 enabled printers without a physical connection. All these
bluetooth-enabled devices have a low cost transceiver
chip. This chip uses the unlicensed frequency band of
2.4 GHz to transmit and receive data. These devices
can send data within a range of 10 meters with a speed
of 1 - 2 Mbps.
In Bluetooth technology, the communicating
devices within a range of 10 meters build a personal
area network called piconet. The devices in a piconet
work in a master-slave configuration. A master device
can communicate with up to 7 active slave devices at
the same time.
Bluetooth technology allows up to 255 devices to
build a network. Out of them, 8 devices can
communicate at the same time and remaining devices
can be inactive, waiting for a response command from
the master device.
(B) Wireless LAN
This is another way of wireless communication. Wireless
LAN is a local area network (LAN), and it is a popular way
to connect to the Internet. The international organisation
IEEE assigns numbers to each different standards of
LAN. The wireless LAN is number as 802.11, and it is
popularly known as Wi-Fi.
These networks consist of communicating devices
such as laptops and mobile phones, as well as the
network device called APs (access points) which is
installed in buildings or floors (Figure 11.13). An
access point is a device that is used to create a wireless
local area network, by connecting to a wired router,
switch,
or hub. The APs are
connected to a wired
Access Point To wired network
network, and all the
devices communicate
or access the Internet
through an access
point.
Wi-Fi gives users
the flexibility to move
around within the
network area while
Tablet Smartphone being connected to the
Laptop Desktop network. Following are
some of the benefits of
Figure 11.13: Access point creating a wireless LAN
214 CWLAN:
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• Wireless connections can be used to extend or replace
an existing wired infrastructure
• Resulted in increased access for mobile devices WiMax stands
• Provides easy access to the Internet in public places for Worldwide
Interoperability
for Microwave
11.7 MOBILE TELECOMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGIES Access. Like Wi-Fi,
it is also used for
Today the mobile phone network is the most used communication in
network in the world. The ability to be connected to wireless networks
the network on-the-go makes it very convenient to but there is a
communicate with people via call or instant messages. difference. Whereas
Wi-Fi is used to
It is also handy to access the Internet using the mobile
form small wireless
phone network through wireless connection. Besides, networks (WLANs),
the Internet of Things (IoT) is letting us control and WiMax uses a
communicate with other smart devices as well. larger spectrum to
deliver connections
The architecture of the mobile network has rapidly to various devices
evolved over the last few decades. The different on the network. It
landmark achievements in mobile communication has a higher data
technologies are classified as different generations. transfer rate and
can span over a
They are identified as 1G, 2G, 3G, 4G, and 5G. Let us
larger area. That
briefly discuss the mobile telecommunication is why it is used in
generations. MAN applications.
The first generation (1G) mobile network system
came around 1982. It was used to transmit only voice
calls. The analog signals were used to carry voices
between the caller and receiver.
The second generation (2G) mobile network system
came around 1991. Instead of analog signals, voice
calls were transmitted in digital form thus providing
improved call quality. This increased capacity allowed
more people to talk simultaneously, and led to improved
security as the signals could be encrypted. It also
enabled an additional service to send SMS and MMS
(Multimedia messages).
The third generation (3G) mobile network technology
was developed during late 90s, but it was introduced
commercially around 2001. It offered both digital voice
and data services. 3G provided Internet access via the
same radio towers that provide voice service to the
mobile phone. It facilitated greater voice and data
capacity. Therefore, more simultaneous calls could
happen in the same frequency range and also a
significantly faster data transfer speed.
Demand for faster data is always increasing and
thus 4G mobile networks were developed and now

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 5G networks have also come into being. 4G is much
Explore how 5G can faster than 3G and this has revolutionised the field of
impact society. telecommunication by bringing the wireless
experience to a new level altogether. 4G systems support
interactive multimedia, voice, video, wireless internet
and other broadband services. Technologically, 4G is
very different compared to 3G.
The fifth generation or 5G is currently under
development. It is expected to be a milestone
development for the success of IoT and Machine to
Machine (M2M) communications. Machine to machine
(M2M) is direct communication between devices —
wired and wireless. 5G is expected to allow data
transfer in Gbps, which is much faster than 4G. It is
expected to be able to support all the devices of the
future such as connected vehicles and the Internet of
Things.

11.8 PROTOCOL
In communication, Protocol is a set of standard rules
that the communicating parties — the sender, the
receiver, and all other intermediate devices need
to follow. We know that the sender and receiver can
be parts of different networks, placed at different
geographic locations. Besides, the data transfer rates in
different networks can vary, requiring data to be sent
in different formats.
11.8.1 Need for Protocols
We need protocols for different reasons such as flow
control, access control, addressing, etc. Flow control is
required when the sender and receiver have different
speeds of sending and receiving the data. Figure 11.14
shows that Computer A is sending data at the speed
of 1024 Mbps and computer B is receiving data at the
speed of 512 Mbps. In this case, Computer B must be
able to inform computer A about the speed mismatch
so that computer A can adjust its data transmission
rate. Otherwise some data will be lost, as shown in
Figure 11.14.
Access control is required to decide which nodes in
a communication channel will access the link shared
among them at a particular instant of time. Otherwise,
the transmitted data packets will collide if computers
are sending data simultaneously through the same link
resulting in the loss or corruption of data.
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 A B

1024 Mbps 512 Mbps

Received Packets
Loss Packets
Figure 11.14: Speed mismatch between two computers can result into
loss of data

Protocols also define:

• how computers identify one another on a network.
• the form to which the data should be converted
for transit.
• how to decide whether the data received is for that
node or to be forwarded to another node.
• ensuring that all the data have reached the
destination without any loss.
• how to rearrange the packets and process them at
the destination.
If all the rules or protocols of a communication
network are defined at one place, it becomes complex
to ensure that communicating parties follow the
guidelines. In this section, we will briefly talk about
some of the protocols required in communication.
11.8.2 HyperText Transfer Protocol (HTTP)
HTTP stands for HyperText Transfer Protocol. It is
the primary protocol used to access the World Wide
Web. Tim Berners-Lee led the development of HTTP at
CERN in 1989 in collaboration with Internet
Engineering Task Force (IETF) and the World Wide Hypertext refers to
Web Consortium (W3C). a document that
contains images
HTTP is a request-response (also called client- or text that can be
server) protocol that runs over TCP. The common use linked to another
of HTTP is between a web browser (client) and a web document or text.
server (server). HTTP facilitates access of hypertext from
the World Wide Web by defining how information are
formatted and transmitted, and how the Web servers
and browsers should respond to various commands.

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 NOTES A web page is written using a markup language like
HTML and is stored on a web server for access via its
URL. Once a user opens a web browser and types in
the URL of the intended web page, a logical
communication link between the user machine (client)
and the web server is created using HTTP.
For example, whenever we enter the URL http//
www.ncert.nic.in in a browser, it sends HTTP request
to the web-server where ncert.nic.in is hosted. The
HTTP response from the web-server fetches and
sends the requested Web-page, which is displayed on
your browser.
11.8.3 File Transfer Protocol (FTP)
File Transfer Protocol (FTP) is the protocol used for
transferring files from one machine to another. Like
HTTP, FTP also works on a client-server model.
When a user requests for a file transfer with
another system, FTP sets up a connection between the
two nodes for accessing the file. Optionally, the user
can authenticate using user ID and password. The user
then specifies the file name and location of the desired
file. After that, another connection sets up and the file
transfer happens directly between the two machines.
However, some servers provide FTP logins without
authentication for accessing files.
File transfer between two systems seems simple
and straightforward because FTP takes care of issues
between two communicating devices, such as:
• use of different conventions while naming files.
• representation of text and data in different formats.
• having different directory structure

11.8.4 Point to Point Protocol (PPP)

PPP is a communication protocol which establishes
a dedicated and direct connection between two
communicating devices. This protocol defines how two
devices will authenticate each other and establish a
direct link between them to exchange data. For example,
two routers with direct connection communicate using
PPP. The Internet users who connect their home
computers to the server of an Internet Service
Provider (ISP) through a modem also use PPP.
The communicating devices should have duplex
modes for using this protocol. This protocol maintains

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data integrity ensuring that the packets arrive in order.
It intimates the sender about damage or lost packets
and asks to resend it.
11.8.5 Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP)
SMTP is a protocol used for email services. It uses
information written on the message header (like an
envelope on a letter sent by post), and is not concerned
with the content of the email message. Each email
header contains email addresses of recipients. The
email containing header and body are entered into a Activity 11.3
queue of outgoing mails. Find and list
The SMTP sender program takes mails from the other Email
Protocols.
outgoing queue and transmits them to the destination(s).
When the SMTP sender successfully delivers a
particular mail to one or more destinations, it removes
the corresponding receiver’s email address from the
mail’s destination list. When that mail is delivered to all
the recipients, it is removed from the outgoing queue.
The SMTP receiver program accepts each mail that has
arrived and places it in the appropriate user mailbox.

11.8.6 Transmission Control Protocol (TCP)/

Internet Protocol (IP)
TCP/IP stands for Transmission Control Protocol/
Internet Protocol. It is a set of standardised rules that
uses a client-server model of communication in which
a user or machine (a client) requests a service by a
server in the network.
The IP protocol ensures that each computer or node
connected to the Internet is assigned an IP address,
which is used to identify each node independently. It can
be considered to be the adhesive that holds the whole
Internet together. TCP ensures that the message or
data is broken into smaller chunks, called IP packets.
Each of these packets are routed (transmitted) through
the Internet, along a path from one router to the next,
until it reaches the specified destination. TCP
guarantees the delivery of packets on the designated IP
address. It is also responsible for ordering the packets
so that they are delivered in sequence.
There are many redundant connection paths in
the Internet, with backbones and ISPs connecting to
each other in multiple locations. So, there are many

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 NOTES possible paths between two hosts. Hence, two packets
of the same message can take two different routes
depending on congestion and other factors in different
possible routes. When all the packets finally reach the
destination machine, they are reassembled into the
original message at the receiver’s end.

SUMMARY
• Data communication refers to the exchange of
data between two or more networked or
connected devices like laptops, PC, printers,
routers etc.
• Sender, receiver, messages, channel and protocols
are major components of data communication.
• In data communication, transmission media are
the links that carry messages between two or
more communicating devices. These are broadly
classified into guided and unguided media.
• In guided transmission, there is a physical link
made of wire/cable through which data in terms
of signals are propagated between the nodes.
These are usually metallic cable, fiber-optic
cable, etc. They are also known as wired media.
• In unguided transmission, data travels in air in
terms of electromagnetic waves using an antenna.
They are also known as wireless media.
• The capacity of channels is measured in
bandwidth. The unit of bandwidth is Hertz.
• Communication can be done in three different
modes — simplex, half-duplex, and full-duplex
communication.
• Switching techniques are alternative to
dedicated lines whereby data is routed through
various nodes in a network. It forms a
temporary route for the data to be transmitted.
Two commonly used switching techniques are –
circuit switching and packet switching.
• Electromagnetic spectrum of frequency ranging
from 3 KHz to 900 THz is available for wireless
communication. This spectrum range (3KHz to
900THz) can be divided into four categories- Radio

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 waves, Microwaves, Infrared waves and Visible or NOTES
Light waves, according to their frequency ranges.
• Bluetooth is a short-range wireless technology
that can be used to connect mobile-phones,
mouse, headphones, keyboards, computers, etc.
wirelessly over a short distance.
• Based on the architecture of the mobile
network, mobile communication technologies are
classified into different generations identified as
1G, 2G, 3G, 4G, and 5G.
• In communication, protocol is a set of standard
rules that the communicating parties — the
sender, the receiver, and all other intermediate
devices need to follow. Flow control, access
control, addressing, etc. are examples of
protocol.
• HTTP stands for HyperText Transfer Protocol. It
is the primary protocol used to access the World
Wide Web, which was developed by Tim Berners-
Lee at CERN in 1989.
• File Transfer Protocol (FTP) is the protocol
used for transferring files from one machine to
another. Like HTTP, FTP also works on a client-
server model.
• Point-to-Point protocol (PPP) defines how two
devices will authenticate each other and establish
a direct link between them to exchange data.
• TCP/IP stands for Transmission Control Protocol/
Internet Protocol. It is a set of standardised
rules that uses a client-server model of
communication in which a user or machine (a
client) requests a service by a server in the
network.

EXERCISE
1. What is data communication? What are the main
components of data communication?
2. Which communication mode allows communication in
both directions simultaneously?
3. Among LAN, MAN, and WAN, which has the highest
speed and which one can cover the largest area?

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 NOTES 4. What are three categories of wired media? Explain them.
5. Compare wired and wireless media.
6. Which transmission media carries signals in the form of
light?
7. List out the advantages and disadvantages of optical
fiber cable.
8. What is the range of frequency for radio waves?
9. 18 Gbps is equal to how many Bits per second?
10. HTTP stands for?
11. Write short note on the following:
a) HTTP
b) Bandwidth
c) Bluetooth
d) DNS
e) Data transfer rate
12. What is protocol in data communication? Explain with
an example.
13. A composite signal contains frequencies between 500
MHz and 1GHz. What is the bandwidth of a signal?

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 h a pter
C
1 Security
2 Aspects

“Treat your password like your

toothbrush. Don't let anybody else use it,
and get a new one every six months.”

— Clifford Stoll

In this Chapter
» Threats and Prevention
» Malware
» Antivirus
» Spam 12.1 THREATS AND PREVENTION
» HTTP vs HTTPS Being alone is the most ideal situation for an
» Firewall individual in terms of security. It applies to
» Cookies computers as well. A computer with no link to
» Hackers and Crackers an external device or computer is free from the
security threats arising otherwise. However,
» Network Security Threats
it is not an ideal solution for a human being
or a computer to stay aloof in order to mitigate
any security threats, as the world at present
is on its way to become fully connected. This
connectedness of various devices and computers
has brought into our focus the various network
threats and its prevention.
Network security is concerned with protection
of our device as well as data from illegitimate
access or misuse. Threats include all the ways in
which one can exploit any vulnerability or
weakness in a network or communication system
in order to cause harm or damage one’s
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reputation.

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 NOTES 12.2 MALWARE
Malware is a short term used for MALicious softWARE.
It is any software developed with an intention to damage
hardware devices, steal data, or cause any other
trouble to the user. Various types of malware have
been created from time-to-time, and large-scale
damages have been inflicted. Many of these malware
programs have been identified and counter measures
have been initiated. However, different types of malware
keep on coming on a regular basis that compromise the
security of computer systems and cause intangible
damages. Besides, each year, malware incur financial
damages worth billions of dollars worldwide. Viruses,
Worms, Ransomware, Trojans, and Spyware are some
of the kinds of malware.
12.2.1 Virus
The term computer virus was coined by Fred Cohen in
1985 and has been borrowed from biological science
with almost similar meaning and behavior, the only
difference is that the victim is a computer system and
the virus is a malicious software. A virus is a piece of
software code created to perform malicious activities
and hamper resources of a computer system like CPU
time, memory, personal files, or sensitive information.
Mimicking the behaviour of a biological virus, the
computer virus spreads on contact with another system,
i.e. a computer virus infects other computer systems
that it comes into contact with by copying or inserting
its code into the computer programs or software
(executable files). A virus remains dormant on a system
and is activated as soon as the infected file is opened
(executed) by a user.
Viruses behave differently, depending upon the
reason or motivation behind their creation. Some of
the most common intentions or motives behind
viruses include stealing passwords or data, corrupting
files, spamming the user’s email contacts, and even
taking control of the user’s machine. Some well-known
viruses include CryptoLocker, ILOVEYOU, MyDoom,
Sasser and Netsky, Slammer, Stuxnet, etc.
12.2.2 Worms
The Worm is also a malware that incurs unexpected or
damaging behaviour on an infected computer system.
The major difference between a worm and a virus is that
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unlike a virus, a worm does not need a host program NOTES
or software to insert its code into. Worms are
standalone programs that are capable of working on
its own. Also, a virus needs human triggering for
replication (i.e. when a user opens/executes the
infected file), while a worm replicates on its own and
can spread to other computers through the network.
Some prominent examples of worms include Storm
Worm, Sobig, MSBlast, Code Red, Nimda, Morris Worm,
etc.
12.2.3 Ransomware
It is a type of malware that targets user data. It
either blocks the user from accessing their own data
or threatens to publish the personal data online and
demands ransom payment against the same. Some
ransomware simply block the access to the data while
others encrypt data making it very difficult to access.
In May 2017, a ransomware WannaCry infected almost
200,000 computers across 150 countries. It worked by
encrypting data and demanding ransom payments in
the Bitcoin cryptocurrency. It literally made its victims
“cry” and hence the name.

Figure 12.1: A ransomware

12.2.4 Trojan
Since the ancient Greeks could not infiltrate the city
of Troy using traditional warfare methods, they gifted
the king of Troy with a big wooden horse with hidden
soldiers inside and eventually defeated them. Borrowing
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 NOTES the concept, a Trojan is a malware, that looks like a
legitimate software and once it tricks a user into
installing it, it acts pretty much like a virus or worm.
However, a Trojan does not self-replicate or infect other
files, it spreads through user interaction such as opening
an email attachment or downloading and executing a file
from the Internet. Some Trojans create backdoors to
give malicious users access to the system.

Figure 12.2: A trojan horse

12.2.5 Spyware
It is a type of malware that spies on a person or an
organisation by gathering information about them,
without the knowledge of the user. It records and sends
the collected information to an external entity without
consent or knowledge of the user.
Spyware usually tracks internet usage data and
sells them to advertisers. They can also be used to
track and capture credit card or bank account
information, login and password information or user’s
personal identity.
12.2.6 Adware
An Adware is a malware that is created to generate
revenue for its developer. An adware displays
online advertisements using pop-ups, web pages, or
installation screens. Once an adware has infected a
substantial number of computer systems, it generates
revenue either by displaying advertisements or using
“pay per click” mechanism to charge its clients against
the number of clicks on their displayed ads. Adware
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is usually annoying, but harmless. However, it often
paves way for other malware by displaying unsafe
links as advertisements. To implement a
keylogger in hardware,
12.2.7 Keyloggers a thin transparent
A keylogger can either be malware or hardware. The keyboard is placed
main purpose of this malware is to record the keys atop the actual
keyboard or input
pressed by a user on the keyboard. A keylogger makes pad of the intended
logs of daily keyboard usage and may send it to an machine, which then
external entity as well. In this way, very sensitive and records the keystrokes
personal information like passwords, emails, private pressed by the user.
conversations, etc. can be revealed to an external
entity without the knowledge of the user. One strategy
to avoid the threat of password leaks by keyloggers is
to use a virtual keyboard while signing into your
online accounts from an unknown computer.

(A) Online Virtual Keyboard Vs On-Screen Keyboard

The names “on-screen” and “virtual” keyboard refer to
any software-based keyboard and are sometimes used
interchangeably. But, there exists a notable difference
between “on-screen” and “online virtual” keyboards.
Both types of keyboards may look the same, but the
difference is in terms of the layout or ordering of the
keys. The on-screen keyboard of an operating system
uses a fixed QWERTY key layout (Figure 12.3), which
can be exploited by sophisticated keylogger software.
However, an online virtual keyboard randomises the
key layout every time it is used (Figure 12.4), thereby
making it very difficult for a keylogger software to
know or record the key(s) pressed by the user.

Figure 12.3: A QWERTY keyboard layout

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 NOTES

Figure 12.4: Online virtual keyboard

12.2.8 Modes of Malware distribution

A malware once designed, can take many routes to
reach your computer. Some of the common distribution
channels for malware are:
• Downloaded from the Internet: Most of the time,
malware is unintentionally downloaded into the
hard drive of a computer by the user. Of course, the
malware designers are smart enough to disguise
their malware, but we should be very careful while
downloading files from the Internet (especially those
highlighted as free stuff).
• Spam Email: We often receive an unsolicited email
with embedded hyperlinks or attachment files. These
links or attached files can be malware.
• Removable Storage Devices: Often, the replicating
malware targets the removable storage media
like pen drives, SSD cards, music players, mobile
phones, etc. and infect them with malware that
gets transferred to other systems that they are
plugged into.
• Network Propagation: Some malware like Worms
have the ability to propagate from one computer to
another through a network connection.

12.2.9 Combating Malware

Common signs of some malware infection include the
following:

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• frequent pop-up windows prompting you to visit NOTES
some website and/or download some software;
• changes to the default homepage of your web
browser;
• mass emails being sent from your email account;
• unusually slow computer with frequent crashes;
• unknown programs startup as you turn on your
computer;
• programs opening and closing automatically;
• sudden lack of storage space, random messages,
sounds, or music start to appear;
• programs or files appear or disappear without your
knowledge.
Malware exists and continues to evolve, and so is
the mechanism to combat them. As the saying goes
that prevention is better than cure, we list some
preventive measures against the malware discussed
earlier.
 Using antivirus, anti-malware, and other related
software and updating them on a regular basis.
 Configure your browser security settings
 Always check for a lock button in the address bar
while making payments.
 Never use pirated on unlicensed software. Instead
go for Free and Open Source Software (FOSS).
 Applying software updates and patches released by
its manufacturers.
 Taking a regular backup of important data.
 Enforcing firewall protection in the network.
 Avoid entering sensitive (passwords, pins) or
personal information on unknown or public
computers.
 Avoid entering sensitive data on an unknown
network (like Wi-Fi in a public place) using your
own computer also.
 Avoid clicking on links or downloading attachments
from unsolicited emails.
 Scan any removable storage device with an antivirus
software before transferring data to and from it.
 Never share your online account or banking
password/pins with anyone.
 Remove all the programs that you don’t recognise
from your system.
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  Do not install an anti-spyware or antivirus program
presented to you in a pop-up or ad.
 Use the pop-up window’s ‘X’ icon located on the
top-right of the popup to close the ad instead of
clicking on the ‘close’ button in the pop-up. If you
notice an installation has been started, cancel
immediately to avoid further damage.

12.3 ANTIVIRUS
Antivirus is a software, also known as anti-malware.
Initially, antivirus software was developed to detect
and remove viruses only and hence the name anti-
virus. However, with time it has evolved and now comes
bundled with the prevention, detection, and removal of
a wide range of malware.
12.3.1 Methods of Malware Identification used by
Antivirus
(A) Signature-based detection
In this method, an antivirus works with the help of
a signature database known as “Virus Definition File
(VDF)”. This file consists of virus signatures and is
updated continuously on a real-time basis. This makes
the regular update of the antivirus software a must. If
there is an antivirus software with an outdated VDF, it
is as good as having no antivirus software installed, as
Virus Signature the new malware will infect the system without getting
A virus signature detected. This method also fails to detect malware that
is a consecutive has an ability to change its signature (polymorphic)
sequence of bytes and the malware that has some portion of its code
that is commonly
found in a certain
encrypted.
malware sample.
That means it’s (B) Sandbox detection
contained within the In this method, a new application or file is executed
malware or the in a virtual environment (sandbox) and its behavioural
infected file and not in fingerprint is observed for a possible malware.
unaffected files. Depending on its behaviour, the antivirus engine
determines if it is a potential threat or not and
proceeds accordingly. Although this method is a little
slow, it is very safe as the new unknown application is
not given access to actual resources of the system.
(C) Data mining techniques
This method employs various data mining and machine
learning techniques to classify the behaviour of a file as
either benign or malicious.

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(D) Heuristics
Often, a malware infection follows a certain pattern.
Here, the source code of a suspected program is
compared to viruses that are already known and are
in the heuristic database. If the majority of the source
code matches with any code in the heuristic database,
the code is flagged as a possible threat.
(E) Real-time protection
Some malware remains dormant or gets activated
after some time. Such malware needs to be checked on
a real-time basis. In this technique, the anti-malware
software keeps running in the background and observes
the behavior of an application or file for any suspicious
activity while it is being executed i.e. when it resides in
the active (main) memory of the computer system.

12.4 SPAM
Spam is a broad term and applies to various digital
platforms like messaging, forums, chatting, emailing,
advertisement, etc. However, the widely recognised
form is email spam. Depending on their requirements,
organisations or individuals buy or create a mailing
list (list of email addresses) and repeatedly send
advertisement links and invitation emails to a large
number of users. This creates unnecessary junk in the
inbox of the receiver’s email and often tricks a user into
buying something or downloading a paid software or
malware.
Nowadays, email services like Gmail, Hotmail, etc.
have an automatic spam detection algorithm that
filters emails and makes things easier for the end
users. A user can also mark an undetected unsolicited
email as “spam”, thereby ensuring that such type of
email is not delivered into the inbox as normal email in
future.
Always look for
12.5 HTTP VS HTTPS the “https://” at
Both the HTTP (Hyper Text Transfer Protocol) and its the beginning of
the address (URL)
variant HTTPS (Hyper Text Transfer Protocol Secure) of the websites
are a set of rules (protocol) that govern how data can while entering your
be transmitted over the WWW (World Wide Web). In banking, personal,
other words, they provide rules for the client web or other sensitive
browser and servers to communicate. information.
HTTP sends information over the network as it is. It
does not scramble the data to be transmitted, leaving

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 it vulnerable to attacks from hackers. Hence, HTTP is
sufficient for websites with public information sharing
like news portals, blogs, etc. However, when it comes
to dealing with personal information, banking
credentials and passwords, we need to communicate
data more securely over the network using HTTPS.
HTTPS encrypts the data before transmission. At the
receiver end, it decrypts to recover the original data.
Activity 12.1 The HTTPS based websites require SSL Digital
Ask your teacher Certificate.
to show you how to
enable and disable 12.6 FIREWALL
firewall on your
computer. Computer firewall is a network security system designed
to protect a trusted private network from unauthorised
access or traffic originating from an untrusted outside
network (e.g., the Internet or different sections of the
same network) to which it is connected (Figure 12.5).
Firewall can be implemented in software, hardware or
both. As discussed earlier, a malware like worm has the
capability to move across the networks and infect other
computers. The firewall acts as the first barrier against
malware.

LAN

WAN
Firewall

Figure 12.5: A firewall between two networks

A firewall acts as a network filter and based on the

predefined security rules, it continuously monitors
and controls the incoming and outgoing traffic. As an
example, a rule can be set in the firewall of a school
LAN, that a student cannot access data from the
finance
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server, while the school accountant can access the
finance server.
12.6.1 Types of Firewall
• Network Firewall: If the firewall is placed between
two or more networks and monitors the network
traffic between different networks, it is termed as
Network Firewall.
• Host-based Firewall: If the firewall is placed on a
computer and monitors the network traffic to and
from that computer, it is called a host-based
firewall.
Assume students in
12.7 COOKIES a class are to finish
their project. For
The term "cookie" was derived from the term "magic this, the access to
cookie" used by Unix programmers to indicate a packet the Internet has also
been given. To ensure
of data that a program receives and sends it back
maximum output i.e
unchanged. A computer cookie is a small file or data timely completion, can
packet, which is stored by a website on the client’s you utilise Firewall
computer. A cookie is edited only by the website that to prevent distraction
created it, the client’s computer acts as a host to store while surfing the net?
the cookie. Cookies are used by the websites to store
browsing information of the user. For example, while
going through an e-commerce website, when a user adds
items to cart, the website usually uses cookies to record
the items in the cart. A cookie can also be used to store
other user-centric information like login credentials,
language preference, search queries, recently viewed
web pages, music choice, favorite cuisine, etc., that
helps in enhancing the user experience and making
browsing time more productive.
Depending upon their task, there are different types
of cookies. Session cookies keep track of the current
session and even terminate the session when there is a
time-out (banking website). So, if you accidentally left
your e-banking page open, it will automatically close
after the time-out. Similarly, authentication cookies
are used by a website to check if the user is previously
logged in (authenticated) or not. This way, you don’t Activity 12.2
need to login again and again while visiting different Open your internet
web pages or links of the same website. You might have browser and check the
also noticed that certain information like your Name, settings for cookies.
Address, Contact, D.O.B, etc. automatically fills up Also, try to locate some
cookie files on
while filling an online form. This auto-fill feature is also your computer
implemented by websites using cookies. system.

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 12.7.1 Threats due to Cookies
Usually, cookies are used for enhancing the user’s
browsing experience and do not infect your computer
with malware. However, some malware might disguise
as cookies e.g. “supercookies”. There is another type of
cookie known as “Zombie cookie” that gets recreated
after being deleted. Some third-party cookies might
share user data without the consent of the user for
advertising or tracking purposes. As a common example,
if you search for a particular item using your search
engine, a third-party cookie will display
advertisements showing similar items on other
websites that you visit later. So, one should be careful
while granting permission to any websites to create
and store cookies on the user computer.

12.8 HACKERS AND CRACKERS

Hackers and crackers are people having a thorough
knowledge of the computer systems, system software
(operating system), computer networks, and
programming. They use this knowledge to find loopholes
and vulnerabilities in computer systems or computer
networks and gain access to unauthorised information.
In simple terms, a hacker is a person that is skilled
enough to hack or take control of a computer system.
Depending on the intent, there are different types
of hackers.
12.8.1 White Hats: Ethical Hacker
A hacktivist is a
hacker with an aim to If a hacker uses its knowledge to find and help in fixing
bring about political the security flaws in the system, its termed as White
and social change. Hat hacker. These are the hackers with good
intentions. They are actually security experts.
Organisations hire ethical or white hat hackers to
check and fix their systems for potential security
threats and loopholes. Technically, white hats work
against black hats.
12.8.2 Black Hats: Crackers
If hackers use their knowledge unethically to break
the law and disrupt security by exploiting the flaws
and loopholes in a system, then they are called black
hat hackers.
12.8.3 Grey Hats
The distinction between different hackers is not always
clear. There exists a grey area in between, which
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represents the class of hackers that are neutral, they NOTES
hack systems by exploiting its vulnerabilities, but they
don’t do so for monetary or political gains. The grey
hats take system security as a challenge and just hack
systems for the fun of it.

12.9 NETWORK SECURITY THREATS

12.9.1 Denial of Service

Denial of Service (DoS) is a scenario, wherein an attacker
(Hacker) limits or stops an authorised user to access
a service, device, or any such resource by overloading
that resource with illegitimate requests. The DoS
attack floods the victim resource with traffic, making
the resource appear busy. If attackers carry out a DoS
attack on a website, they will flood it with a very large
number of network packets by using different IP
addresses. This way, the web server would be
overloaded and will not be able to provide service to a
legitimate user. The users will think that the website is
not working, causing damage to the victim’s
organisation. Same way, DoS attacks can be done on
resources like email servers, network storage,
disrupting connection between two machines or
disrupting the state of information (resetting of
sessions).
If a DoS attack makes a server crash, the server or
resource can be restarted to recover from the attack.
However, a flooding attack is difficult to recover from,
as there can be some genuine legitimate requests in it
as well.
A variant of DoS, known as Distributed Denial of
Service (DDoS) is an attack, where the flooded requests
come from compromised computer (Zombies) systems
distributed across the globe or over a very large area.
The attacker installs a malicious software known as Bot
on the Zombie machines, which gives it control over
these machines. Depending upon the requirement and
availability, the attacker activates a network of these
Zombie computers known as Bot-Net to carry out the
DDoS attack. While as a simple DoS attack may be
countered by blocking requests or network packets from
a single source, DDoS is very difficult to resolve, as the
attack is carried from multiple distributed locations.

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 12.9.2 Intrusion Problems
Network Intrusion refers to any unauthorised activity
on a computer network. These activities may involve
unauthorised use of network resources (DoS) or
threatening the security of the network and the data.
Network intrusion is a very serious problem and the
network administrator needs to devise strategy and
implement various security measures to protect the
network. We have already discussed some of the
intrusion attacks such as DoS, Trojans, and Worms.
The remaining attacks are briefly discussed below.
(A) Asymmetric Routing
The attacker tends to avoid detection by sending the
intrusion packets through multiple paths, thereby
bypassing the network intrusion sensors.
(B) Buffer Overflow Attacks
In this attack, the attacker overwrites certain memory
areas of the computers within the network with code
(set of commands) that will be executed later when the
buffer overflow (programming error) occurs. Once the
malicious code is executed, an attacker can initiate a
DoS attack or gain access to the network.
(C) Traffic Flooding
It is one of the most trivial methods of network intrusion.
It involves flooding the network intrusion detection
system with message packets. This huge load leaves the
network detection system incapable of monitoring the
packets adequately. The hacker takes advantage of this
congested and chaotic network environment to sneak
into the system undetected.
12.9.3 Snooping
URL Snooping Snooping means secretly listening to a conversation.
It is a software In the context of networking, it refers to the process of
package that secret capture and analysis of network traffic. It is a
downloads and stores
a web stream as a file,
computer program or utility that has a network traffic
that can be viewed monitoring capability. In this attack, the hacker taps or
or used later. The listens to a channel of communication by picking all of
common online video the traffic passing through it. Once the network
downloaders use the packets are analysed by the snooping device or
same techniques to
software, it reproduces the exact traffic packets and
download videos from
the Web. places them back in the channel, as if nothing has
happened. So, if the data that is being sent over the
network is not encrypted, it is vulnerable to snooping
and eventually
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may cause serious damage, depending upon the type of NOTES
information leak. However, snooping is not always an
attack, at times it is also used by network administrators
for troubleshooting various network issues. Snooping is
also known as Sniffing.
Various snooping software exist that act as network
traffic analyser. Besides, various network hubs and
switches have a SPAN (Sniffer Port Analyser) port
function for snooping.
12.9.4 Eavesdropping
The term eavesdropping has been derived from the
literal practice of secretly listening to the conversations
of people by standing under the eaves of a house. Unlike
snooping, where the network traffic can be stored for
later analysis, eavesdropping is an unauthorised real-
time interception or monitoring of private
communication between two entities over a network.
Also, the targets
1 1 00 1000111
100 11
0 11 11
0 00
1 00
11 0
1 0
1 0
1 1
0 0
0 1
0

0 0
0 1
1 0
1
11 01
11 111
10 1
10 11
10 1 11
1 01 0
0 1 1000

Figure 12.6: Eavesdropping

are usually the private communication channels like
phone calls (VoIP), instant messages, video conference,
fax transmission, etc. In older days, eavesdropping
was performed on the conventional telephone line and
was known as wiretapping. Digital devices like laptops
and cell phones that have a built-in microphone or
camera can be easily hacked and eavesdropped using
rootkit malware.
Eavesdropping is different from Snooping. While the
former happens in real time, the latter does not. As an

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 NOTES example, in eavesdropping, imagine someone listening
to your private conversation with the help of a hidden
microphone in your room or by physically standing near
the window of your room. However, in snooping, that
person may make a copy of a letter that is addressed to
your friend and keep the copy with himself and send the
original letter to the intended address.

SUMMARY
• Malware is a software developed with an intention
to damage computer hardware, software, steal
data, or cause any other trouble to a user.
• A virus is a piece of software code created
to perform malicious activities and hamper
resources of a computer system.
• The Worm is also a malware that incurs
unexpected or damaging behaviour on an infected
computer system.
• Worms are standalone programs that are capable
of working on its own.
• Ransomware is a type of malware that targets
user data.
• Ransomware either blocks the user from
accessing their own data or threatens to publish
their personal data online and demands ransom
payment against the same.
• Trojan is a malware, that looks like a legitimate
software and once it tricks a user into installing
it, it acts pretty much like a virus or a worm.
• Spyware records and sends the collected
information to an external entity without the
consent or knowledge of a user.
• An adware displays unwanted online
advertisements using pop-ups, web pages, or
installation screens.
• A keylogger makes logs of daily keyboard usage
and may send it to an external entity as well.
• The on-screen keyboard is an application software
that uses a fixed QWERTY key layout.
• Online virtual keyboard is a web-based or a
standalone software with a randomised key
layout every time it is used.
• A malware can take many routes to reach your
computer, which include: Downloaded from the

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 Internet, Spam Email, using infected Removable
Storage Devices, and network propagation. NOTES
• An antivirus software is used to detect and remove
viruses and hence the name anti-virus.
• Antiviruses now come bundled with the
prevention, detection, and removal of a wide range
of malware.
• Some of the prominent methods of malware
identification used by an antivirus include:
Signature-based detection, Sandbox detection,
Heuristics.
• Any unwanted data, information, email,
advertisement, etc. is called Spam.
• HTTP (Hyper Text Transfer Protocol) and HTTPS
(Hyper Text Transfer Protocol Secure) are a set
of rules or protocol that govern how data can be
transmitted over the World Wide Web.
• Firewall is a network security system designed
to protect a trusted private network from
unauthorised access or traffic originating from an
untrusted external network.
• There are two basic types of firewalls — Network
Firewall and Host-based Firewall.
• A computer cookie is a small file or data packet,
which is stored by a website on the client’s
computer.
• Cookies are used by the websites to store browsing
information of the user.
• Hackers/Crackers find loopholes and
vulnerabilities in computer systems or computer
networks and gain access to unauthorised
information.
• If a hacker uses its knowledge to find and help in
fixing the security flaws in the system, its termed
as White Hat hacker.
• If hackers use their knowledge unethically to
break the law and disrupt security by exploiting
the flaws and loopholes in a system, then they
are called black hat hackers.
• The grey hats take system security as a challenge
and just hack systems for the fun of it.
• The Denial of Service (DoS) attack floods the
victim resource with traffic, making the resource
appear busy.
• Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) is an
attack, where the flooded requests come from

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 NOTES
compromised computer (Zombies) systems
distributed across the globe or over a very
large area.
• Network Intrusion refers to any unauthorised
activity on a computer network.
• Snooping is the process of secret capture and
analysis of network traffic by malicious users.
• Eavesdropping is an unauthorised real-
time interception or monitoring of private
communication between two entities over
a network.

EXERCISE
1. Why is a computer considered to be safe if it is not
connected to a network or Internet?
2. What is a computer virus? Name some computer viruses
that were popular in recent years.
3. How is a computer worm different from a virus?
4. How is Ransomware used to extract money from users?
5. How did a Trojan get its name?
6. How does an adware generate revenue for its creator?
7. Briefly explain two threats that may arise due to a
keylogger installed on a computer.
8. How is a Virtual Keyboard safer than On Screen
Keyboard?
9. List and briefly explain different modes of malware
distribution.
10. List some common signs of malware infection.
11. List some preventive measures against malware
infection.
12. Write a short note on different methods of malware
identification used by antivirus software.
13. What are the risks associated with HTTP? How can we
resolve these risks by using HTTPS?
14. List one advantage and disadvantage of using Cookies.
15. Write a short note on White, Black, and Grey Hat
Hackers.
16. Differentiate between DoS and DDoS attack.
17. How is Snooping different from Eavesdropping?

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 h a pter
C
Project
1 Based
3 Learning

“An idea that is developed and put into

action is more important than idea that
exists only as an idea.”

— Gautam Buddha

In this Chapter
» Introduction
» Approaches for Solving
Projects
» Teamwork
13.1 INTRODUCTION
» Project Descriptions
Project based learning gives a thorough practical
exposure to students regarding a problem upon
which the project is based. Through project based
learning, students learn to organise their project
and use their time effectively for successful
completion of the project. Projects are developed
generally in groups where students can learn
various skills such as working together, problem
solving, decision making, and investigating
activities. Project based learning involves the
steps such as analysing the problem, formulating
the problem into small modules, applying the
mechanism or method to solve each module and
then integrating the solution of all the modules
to arrive at the complete solution of the problem.
To solve a problem, it is required that those who
work on it gather the relevant data and process
it by applying a particular method. Data may
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 NOTES be collected as per the requirement of the project in
a particular format. All the team members should be
associated to accomplish the task. After collecting data,
it should be processed to solve the problem. The results
should be reported in a predetermined format.

13.2 APPROACHES FOR SOLVING PROJECTS

The approach followed for the development and
completion of a project plays a pivotal role in project
based learning. There are several approaches to execute
a project such as modular approach, top down approach
and bottom up approach. A structured or a modular
approach to a project means that a project is divided into
various manageable modules and each of the modules
has a well-defined task to be performed with a set of
inputs. This would lead to a set of outputs which when
integrated leads to the desired outcome.
Different steps involved in project based learning
(Figure 13.1) are :
(1) Identification of a project: The project idea may
come through any real-life situation. For example,
one could think of doing a project for organising a
seminar. One needs to understand the usefulness
of the project and its impact. Students must be
encouraged to undertake interdisciplinary projects.
(2) Defining a plan: Normally for any kind of project,
there are several project members involved in it. One
project leader has to be identified. The roles of project
leader and each project member have to be clearly
defined. Students who are performing a project must
be assigned with specific activities. The various tools
for executing these activities must be known. To
obtain a better solution, one should always think of
the extreme situations.
(3) Fixing of a time frame and processing: Every
project is a time relevance project. A student must
understand the importance of time frame for
completion of the project. All the activities which are
performed in the projects require a certain amount
of time. Every project must be well structured and at
the same time it must be flexible in its time frame.

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 Identification of Defining a
Project Plan

Fixing time frame Guidance and

and processing Monitoring

Outcome
of project

Figure 13.1: Steps in project based learning

(4) Providing guidance and monitoring a project:
Many times, the participants in the project get
stuck up with a particular process and it becomes
impossible to proceed further. In such a case, they
need guidance, which can be obtained from various
resources such as books, websites and experts in
the field. While it is essential that the project leader
should ensure monitoring of the project, the guide
teacher also helps in monitoring the project.
(5) Outcome of a project: One needs to understand
thoroughly the outcome of a project. The outcome
can be single, or it can be multiple. The output
of a project can be peer reviewed and can be
modified as per the feedback from the guide teacher
or other users.

13.3 TEAMWORK
Many real-life tasks are very complex and require a lot of
individuals to contribute in achieving them. Efforts made
by individuals collectively to accomplish a task is called
teamwork.
For example, in many sports, there is a team of
players. These players play together to win a match.
Take an example of a cricket team. We find that even if
a bowler bowls a good ball but if the fielder cannot take

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 NOTES a catch then the wicket cannot be taken. So, in order
to take a catch, efforts of a bowler as well as of fielders
are needed. To win a cricket match, contributions from
all the team members in all the three areas batting,
bowling and fielding are required.
13.3.1 Components of Teamwork
Apart from technical proficiency, a wide variety of other
components make a successful teamwork. It comprises
skilled team members with specific roles to achieve
the goal.
(A) Communicate with Others
When a group of individuals perform one job, it is
necessary to have effective communication between
the members of the team. Such communication can
be done via e-mails, telephones or by arranging group
meetings. This helps the team members to understand
each other and sort out their problems to achieve the
goal effectively.
(B) Listen to Others
It is necessary to understand the ideas of others while
executing a job together. This can be achieved when the
team members listen to each other in group meetings
and follow steps that are agreed upon.
(C) Share with Others
Ideas, images and tools need to be shared with each
other in order to perform a job. Sharing is an important
component of teamwork. Any member of the team who is
well versed in a certain area should share the expertise
and experience with others to effectively achieve the
goal within the time frame.
(D) Respect for Others
Every member of the team must be treated
respectfully. All the thoughts and ideas that are put
forth in the group meetings may be respected and duly
considered. Not respecting the views of a particular
member may cause problems and that particular team
member may not give his best.
(E) Help Others
A helping hand from every member is a key to success.
Sometimes help from people who are not a part of the
team is also obtained in order to accomplish a job.

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(F) Participate NOTES
All the team members must be encouraged by each
other to participate in completing the project and also
in discussions in group meetings. Also, every member
should take an active participation so that they feel
their importance in the team.

13.4 PROJECT DESCRIPTIONS

In this section, some examples of project works are
given, which can be taken up in groups under project
based learning. However, a group may choose any
other project in consultation with the guide teacher.
Project Title 1: Automation of Order Processing in a
Restaurant

Description
A new restaurant “Stay Healthy” is coming up in your
locality. The owner/management of the restaurant
wants to use a computer to generate bills and maintain
other records of the restaurant. Your team is asked to
develop an application software to automate the order
placing and associated processes.

Specifications
Make a group of students to undertake a project on
automating the order processing of the restaurant
‘Stay Healthy’. The owner of the restaurant wants the
following specific functionalities to be made available in
the developed application:
• There should be two types of Login options — one for
the manager of the joint and other for the customer.
• Kiosk(s) running the software for customers will be
placed at reception for placing the order. On the
opening screen, menu for placing orders will be
displayed.
• To place orders, customers will enter Item Code(s)
and quantity desired.
• After placing an order, a soft copy of the bill will be
displayed on the kiosk, having an Order Number.
• Every bill will have a unique identification (such as
combination of date, and order number of the day)
and should be saved in the data file/database.
• Order Number starts from 1 every day.

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 NOTES • For Manager login—provision for entry/change of
Menu, deletion of Order (on demand) and generation
of following report is desired.
 A Report giving Summary of the Sales made on
a Day. Program should accept the date for which
the Summary is required.
• Add at least one more relevant report of your choice
to the program.

Project Title 2 : Development of a Puzzle

Description
Implement a puzzle solving game in Python. The game
presents a grid board composed of cells to the player, in
which some cells have Bomb. Player is required to clear
the board (of the bomb), without detonating any one of
them with the help of clue(s) provided on the board.

Specifications
For clearing the board, the player will click a cell on
the board, if the cell contains a bomb, the game
finishes. If the cell does not contain a bomb, then the
cell reveals a number giving a clue about the number
of bombs hidden in adjacent cells.
Before you start coding the game, play any
Minesweeper game five times. This will help you in
proper understanding of your project. To reduce the
complexity of the program you can fix the grid size to
6x6 and number of bombs to 6.
Note: Do ensure to handle various exception(s) which may
occur while playing the game, in your code.

Project Title 3 : Development of an Educational Game

Description
You are a member of the ICT club of your school. As a
club member, you are given the responsibility of
identifying ways to improve mathematical skills of kids,
in the age group of 5-7 years. One of the club members
suggested developing an Edutainment Game named
“Match the Sum” for it. Match the Sum will hone
summing skills of student(s), by allowing them to form
number 10 by adding 2/3 digits.

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Specifications NOTES
Following are the details of provisions required for
program:
• Display a list of 15 cells on screen, where each cell
can hold a digit (1 to 9)
• Randomly generate a digit at a time and place it in
the list from the right end. Program will keep on
generating digits at equal intervals of time and place
it in the rightmost cell. (Already existing digits, will
be shifted left, by one cell, with every new addition of
digits’ in the list)
• For playing the game, students’ will be allowed to
type 2/3 digits (one at a time) currently displayed in
the list of cells.
• If the sum of those digits is 10, then those digits
should get removed from the list of cells.
• Game will continue till there is an empty cell to
insert a digit in the list of cells.
Note: Do take care of the situation when digits displayed in
a list of cells do not add up to 10.

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 NOTES

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