Database Management Systems

This class is about Database Management Systems. As such we talk about creating, managing and programming SQL databases. When time permits, we also cover spatial/spatial temporal data and database systems. This site contains content developed by Dr. Anderson for his classes.

2011 Winter Class

• Course Schedule 2011

Programming Examples

• Lecture 1: It really easy that easy to do small things

  • Commandline Connected Example

  • Forms Disconnected Example

• Lecture 2: Look at the Objects we used in the Forms from Lecture 1.

  • DataSet Class

  • Filled by TableAdapter contained in the TableAdapterManager

  • BindingSource as a service provider

    • How are GUI elements bound then?
    • How do the GUI elements change?

  • BindingNavigator

• Lecture 3: Detail Tables, Validation and other GUI Objects
  • What you bind to makes all the difference.
  • Responding to the Validating Event

  • For anything other than small, independent projects consider the Entity Framework with LINQ.

• Lecture 4: /EntityFrameworkExample

Programming & Design Resources

Learning to program something more complex than a one off programming assignments for students can be difficult. Where do the experts learn to program large database applications and what tools and methods do they use? This section is not an answer, but a suggestion on where to look for those answers. Someday, I hope to have a class that explores this in depth.

• DBDesigner is an awesome tool that went for pay by oracle now. Get the old one and don't pay for the ability to reverse engineer a diagram from a database. Works with Oracle, MSSQL and MySQL.

• Domain Driven Design website

• MSDN Patterns and Practices

• NHibernate

• Naked Entites/Objects is a for pay framework

• CSLA.NET

• SpecExpress

• TeamCity

• AutoMapper

And many more to follow I'm sure.

Project Ideas

See: Project Ideas

Chapter Hints

READ THIS BEFORE YOU DO YOUR HOMEWORK and it will help you!

Chapter 6.1: Relational Algebra

Rule 1: You don't need to qualify the results of a natural join. The results of a natural join ALWAYS only have one copy of overlapping attributes.

Rule 2: Predicates, attribute lists and functions in <<latex($\sigma, \Pi, \mathcal{G}$)>> are always subscript.

Rule 3: Relations, whether expressions or names, NEVER appear as a superscript or subscript.

Rule 4: Input relations, whether expressions or name, always have parenthesis around them. E.g.

<<latex(\Large$_{sect\_id,course\_id,year,semester}\mathcal{G}_{count(ID)}(student \bowtie takes)$)>>

Chapter 3 and 4 Hints

If you are having problems joining tables in the FROM and WHERE clauses, you are in the majority. There are two hints that I will give you to help you obtain the right perspective on joining tables:

Rule 1: Just because two attributes have the same name doesn't mean that you should join them on these attributes. STOP, THINK about the semantics (the meaning) of the attribute. Do they both refer to the same thing? If the answer is yes, then you should join on them. Using NATURAL JOIN will match strings, not semantics, so be careful.

Rule 2: When you are looking at the attributes and relations, something is a foreign key only if it is the primary key in a different relation. Even if the foreign key is part (but not all) of the key in the relation it is in, it is a foreign key.

Rule 3: The book doesn't always give you all the attributes that make up the primary key. Look carefully at the values and make sure when you create tables in Chapter 4 that the attributes you select to be the primary key are sufficient to uniquely identify a each row.