Transactional Information Systems: Theory, Algorithms, and the Practice of Concurrency Control and Recovery (The Morgan Kaufmann Series in Data Management Systems) [Hardcover]

Gerhard Weikum (Author), Gottfried Vossen (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 1558605088 | ISBN-13: 978-1558605084 | Publication Date: June 4, 2001 | Edition: 1

Transactional Information Systems is the long-awaited, comprehensive work from leading scientists in the transaction processing field. Weikum and Vossen begin with a broad look at the role of transactional technology in today's economic and scientific endeavors, then delve into critical issues faced by all practitioners, presenting today's most effective techniques for controlling concurrent access by multiple clients, recovering from system failures, and coordinating distributed transactions.

The authors emphasize formal models that are easily applied across fields, that promise to remain valid as current technologies evolve, and that lend themselves to generalization and extension in the development of new classes of network-centric, functionally rich applications. This book's purpose and achievement is the presentation of the foundations of transactional systems as well as the practical aspects of the field what will help you meet today's challenges.

* Provides the most advanced coverage of the topic available anywhere--along with the database background required for you to make full use of this material.
* Explores transaction processing both generically as a broadly applicable set of information technology practices and specifically as a group of techniques for meeting the goals of your enterprise.
* Contains information essential to developers of Web-based e-Commerce functionality--and a wide range of more "traditional" applications.
* Details the algorithms underlying core transaction processing functionality.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"This book is a major advance for transaction processing. It gives an in-depth presentation of both the theoretical and practical aspects of the field, and is the first to present our new understanding of multi-level (object model) transaction processing. It's likely to become the standard reference in our field for many years to come."
—Jim Gray, Microsoft

From the Back Cover

"This book is a major advance for transaction processing. It gives an in-depth presentation of both the theoretical and practical aspects of the field, and is the first to present our new understanding of multi-level (object model) transaction processing. It's likely to become the standard reference in our field for many years to come."

--Jim Gray, Microsoft

Transactional Information Systems is the long-awaited, comprehensive work from leading scientists in the transaction processing field. Weikum and Vossen begin with a broad look at the role of transactional technology in today's economic and scientific endeavors, then delve into critical issues faced by all practitioners, presenting today's most effective techniques for controlling concurrent access by multiple clients, recovering from system failures, and coordinating distributed transactions.

The authors emphasize formal models that are easily applied across fields, that promise to remain valid as current technologies evolve, and that lend themselves to generalization and extension in the development of new classes of network-centric, functionally rich applications. This book's purpose and achievement is the presentation of the foundations of transactional systems as well as the practical aspects of the field what will help you meet today's challenges.

Features

• Provides the most advanced coverage of the topic available anywhere--along with the database background required for you to make full use of this material.
  
• Explores transaction processing both generically as a broadly applicable set of information technology practices and specifically as a group of techniques for meeting the goals of your enterprise.
  
• Contains information essential to developers of Web-based e-Commerce functionality--and a wide range of more "traditional" applications.
  
• Details the algorithms underlying core transaction processing functionality.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 852 pages
• Publisher: Morgan Kaufmann; 1 edition (June 4, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1558605088
• ISBN-13: 978-1558605084
• Product Dimensions: 9.5 x 7.8 x 1.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3.8 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #724,720 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

38 of 38 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Up-to-date ... sends an old friend into semi-retirement, July 5, 2002

By 

Mike Tarrani "www.tarrani.com" (Deltona, FL USA) - See all my reviews
(COMMUNITY FORUM 04)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Transactional Information Systems: Theory, Algorithms, and the Practice of Concurrency Control and Recovery (The Morgan Kaufmann Series in Data Management Systems) (Hardcover)

Before this book was published my primary reference and personal favorite TP book was "Transaction Processing: Concepts and Techniques" by Jim Gray and Andreas Reuter. At over 1100 pages that book thoroughly covered the basics and drilled down into the nuances of transaction processing in a way unmatched by other books on the topic since it was first published in 1993.

This book changes that by going far beyond transaction processing. It starts with the same fundamentals as the older book, and even covers many of the same topics, such as concurrency control, but it addresses each topic from a much wider perspective. For example, the discussion of concurrency goes far beyond the issues of transaction processing as a middleware component. It extends into application, database and search issues. Another indication that this book is more up-to-date is the material on queue managers. While they are at the opposite end of the spectrum from transaction processing monitors, they are integral to any discussion of transactional information systems. More importantly, both transaction processing monitors and queue managers are used in modern enterprise architectures. Having both topics discussed in great detail is a major point in this book's favor.

Personally I intend to keep my copy of the older "Transaction Processing: Concepts and Techniques" because it does cover some of the subject matter more deeply. However, this book has replaced it as my principal reference and if I had to choose between them this is the one I'd go with.

20 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A wonderfully written book on an important topic, December 21, 2004

By 

Richard Snodgrass (Tucson, AZ USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Transactional Information Systems: Theory, Algorithms, and the Practice of Concurrency Control and Recovery (The Morgan Kaufmann Series in Data Management Systems) (Hardcover)

Database concurrency control and recovery is one of pinnacles of computer science. An amazing collection of models, theoretical results, and implementation techniques enable thousands of users to simultaneously pound on a large database implemented on unreliable disks and networks, with full confidence that their data will be correctly stored. This book tells how this miracle is accomplished.

I teach database systems and also do research on databases, including systems-level refinements to concurrency control and recovery algorithms. This book has been invaluable to me in understanding the three major aspects of concurrency control in databases: the beautiful theory, the carefully constructed algorithms, and the specifics of the practice.

When this book first came out two years ago, I read most of it over a period of an intense week. That was such an enjoyable experience, because the book is very well structured and written in a smooth yet careful style. The authors ensured that all required concepts were in place before introducing a new concept. And the prose just flows, rendering difficult concepts understandable through well-chosen examples.

Since then I have referred to this book often with specific questions that arose in my research. Each time, my question has been answered fully in the book.

Each chapter ends with a section entitled "Lessons Learned" which summarizes the key ideas of the chapter and just as importantly, states the practical application of each concept. Some concepts have not yet been realized in practice; the authors are up front about this and explain why.

Mike Tarrani's review does a good job of explaining the similarities and differences between this book and the other seminal book on transaction processing, by Jim Gray and Andreas Reuter. Both books have their place, and both should be on the shelf (and read by!) all those who want to understand transaction processing at a deep level. And I agree with Jim Gray who noted in his foreword to the Weikum/Vossen book that it is likely to become (indeed, has) the standard reference in this field.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Very Very Good, October 6, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: Transactional Information Systems: Theory, Algorithms, and the Practice of Concurrency Control and Recovery (The Morgan Kaufmann Series in Data Management Systems) (Hardcover)

Exceptionally clear writing. Encyclopedic in its coverage of transactions. Anyone dealing with transactions (not just DB developers) would find this a very valuable resource. If you need a book on transactions, this should be your first choice.