Relational Database Design Clearly Explained [Paperback]

Jan L. Harrington (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 19, 1998 | ISBN-10: 0123264251 | ISBN-13: 978-0123264251 | Edition: 1st

The majority of database systems being installed today are based on the relational database model. Unfortunately, relational database design is one of the most misunderstood aspects of computing. Part of the problem comes from popular literature that describes a relational database as anything that has "relationships between files." And those who do understand that a relational database is really nothing more than a collection of two-dimensional tables are caught between good design and the performance of the database. They are often unaware of the side-effects of many of their poor design decisions.

* Approaches relational database design with a balance of theory and practice; and the theory is targeted towards real-world practice
* Presents an entity-relationship approach and a relational theory approach; explains how they are related and how they cross check each other to validate the design
* Includes in-depth database design case studies

Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

Relational Database Design Clearly Explained teaches database practitioners the principles of good relational database design. It discusses tradeoffs between theory and practice (i.e. when it's ok to violate a principle of good design in order to improve performance). The book also shows readers how to construct the SQL statements needed to install well-designed relational databases, and discusses other performance related database design issues, such as indexes and clustering.

Features:

• Approaches relational database design with a balance of theory and practice; and the theory is targeted towards real-world practice
  
• Presents an entity-relationship approach and a relational theory approach; explains how they are related and how they cross check each other to validate the design
  
• Includes in-depth database design case studies
  

About the Author

Jan L. Harrington, the author of 30 books, including SQL, Clearly Explained (Academic Press), has been writing about databases since 1984. She is a professor and chair of the department of computer science and information systems at Marist College, where she teaches database design and management, object-oriented programming, data communications, and computer architecture.

Product Details

• Paperback: 286 pages
• Publisher: Morgan Kaufmann; 1st edition (August 19, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0123264251
• ISBN-13: 978-0123264251
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 7.3 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 5.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (23 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,666,347 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

32 of 33 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great place to start learning databases, June 29, 2000

By 

Russell Belfer (San Mateo, CA United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Relational Database Design Clearly Explained (Paperback)

I've been programming for quite a while, but up until a couple of years ago, I had never done anything with databases. When I switched jobs and needed to learn, I asked a few friends where to begin. At the time they recommended "SQL For Dummies" and "Oracle8: The Complete Reference" -- starting with the first and then diving in to the second.

This didn't work so well for me. SQL For Dummies is actually a reasonable review of constructing basic SQL statements, but it didn't provide me with any conceptual framework for thinking about databases. The complete Oracle8 reference book certainly seemed to have a lot of material in it, but it was a bit too daunting (1300 pages) for a tutorial. I learned the basics that I needed to learn and have gradually assimilated things since then.

Recently I came across this book at Amazon and found that it had pretty good customer reviews, so I thought I'd check it out. It is excellent. This is the book I wish I had had from day one.

The book begins by reviewing basic concepts of databases and database design, plus by going over the various documents and diagrams that typically go along with databases. Then it briefly reviews the SQL one would use to create databases. And it ends with three detailed database design examples. These examples are pretty substantial -- in each case I read the description and thought "this is too complex a database to cover here" but the author broke the problem in comprehensible pieces, drew entity-relationship diagrams, and worked through the design.

I highly recommend this book to people just starting out with databases. You will probably need to follow it with something that teaches you more SQL, but that should follow, not preceed, an introduction like this.

37 of 39 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Database Design clearly skipped over..., December 27, 2000

By 

John Crighton (Pearland, TX USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Relational Database Design Clearly Explained (Paperback)

The author claims to have condensed a college course down into a single 300 page book, which I would have trouble believing except that she apparently skipped over 1/2 of the course content. I do not think that this is a good book to explain Relational Databases, OR Database Design. The author gives a cursory explanation of each, then dives into an example DB with many hard-to-understand tables.

After confusing the reader with a 200,000 foot overview of Databases, the author goes into a very detailed explanation of the normalization process, which is IMPOSSIBLE to understand, and a long, drawn-out review of the theory of how a Relational Database Server should work, with no explanation of how current products do or do not adhere to this theory.

The author spends quite a bit of time plugging a Macintosh-Based ER system, all the way down to a section explaining the drawing environment of that *piece* of software.

Overall, this book was a waste of time. Buy Database Design for Mere Mortals by Michael J. Hernandez , a MUCH better book.

25 of 26 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A great introduction to database design!, July 8, 1999

By 

Thomas E. Denham (Alpharetta, GA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Relational Database Design Clearly Explained (Paperback)

Jan Harrington accomplishes her task neatly, to clearly explain relational database design. I was very pleased with how quickly I was able to grasp fundamental concepts and I would recommend this book to anyone getting started with databases. I had hoped that the book would be perfect and would clearly explain every relevant concept but that was not the case. When it came to the three interesting case studies that concluded the book, the author used concepts that were never explained - control-break layout, parent entities, ISAM file organization, repeating groups, reblocking files. While not understanding these concepts did not stop me from grasping the fundamentals of database design it was frustrating and made clear that this is an introductory text and not the last book to read on the subject. There were also about a dozen typos but these were disconcerting rather than misleading.