Information Systems Program
Module 11
Normalization Concepts and Practice
Lesson 4: Practical Concerns
Lesson Objectives
• Reflect on role of normalization
• Reflect on importance of normalization
• Reflect on situations to relax normalization
requirements
Information Systems Program
Competing Roles of Normalization
Refinement
• Use after ERD
• Few FDs
Initial Design
• FDs first
• ERD after FDs
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Normalization Importance
• Update biased
• Not a major concern for databases without updates (data
warehouses)
• Relax normalization sometimes
Information Systems Program
Denormalization
• Purposeful violation of a normal form
• Some FDs may not cause anomalies in practice
• May improve performance
• Common for data warehouses
Information Systems Program
Denormalization Example
• ZipCode City, State
• Important for ecommerce business for sales tax
• May be important for ecommerce databases
Information Systems Program
Summary
• Covered practical issues
• Use normalization as a refinement approach
• Do not lose context of normalization when performing
details
Information Systems Program