Customer Reviews

Data Analysis for Database Design, Third Edition

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A nice way to learn SQL99. The book is heavily into using examples to motivate this learning. The discussion is at the level of abstract database design, instantiated by examples. But, it also gets into the syntax of SQL.

The narrative is easy to understand; requiring nothing in prior knowledge of SQL. The book is all about designing relational tables to handle your data needs.

As an aside: If you are tempted to use the popular and free MySQL, in applying what you have learnt hear, please be aware that since MySQL doesn't allow foreign keys, a lot of the table designs may have to be totally redone.

I read the 1st edition 20 years ago and it was a very thorough and rigorous text with excellent questions and exercises. The abstract theory is very clearly explained. Unfortunately, that edition did not cover Relational DB, so I can't comment on that treatment.

MySQL *does* support foreign keys. However, its SQL implementation does not support the *SQL FOREIGN KEY constraint* capability without some reconfiguration. This means that foreign key integrity generally has to be enforced outside of SQL. You can still use foreign keys.