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Encyclopedia > Database design

Database design is the process of producing a detailed data model of a database. This model contains all the needed logical and physical design choices and physical storage parameters needed to generate a design in a Data Definition Language, which can then be used to create a database. A fully attributed data model contains detailed attributes for each entity. A data model is a model that describes how data are represented and used in an abstract way. ... The term or expression database originated within the computer industry. ... A Data Definition Language (DDL) is a computer language for defining data. ...


The term database design can be used to describe many different parts of the design of an overall database system. Principally, and most correctly, it can be thought of as the logical design of the base data structures used to store the data - in the relational model these are the tables and views. However, the term database design could also be used to apply to the overall process of designing, not just the base data structures, but also the forms and queries used as part of the overall database application within the Database Management System or DBMS. A database management system (DBMS) is a computer program (or more typically, a suite of them) designed to manage a database, a large set of structured data, and run operations on the data requested by numerous users. ... The relational model for database management is a database model based on predicate logic and set theory. ... A table can be the basic component of a relational database (RDB). ... Originally, in database theory, a view is a read only virtual or logical table composed of the result set of a query. ... A database management system (DBMS) is a system or software designed to manage a database, and run operations on the data requested by numerous clients. ...

Contents

Design process

The process of doing database design generally consists of a number of steps which will be carried out by the database designer. Not all of these steps will be necessary in all cases, but most usually, the designer must:

  • Determine the data to be stored in the database
  • Determine the relationships between the different data elements
  • Superimpose a logical structure upon the data on the basis of these relationships.

Within the relational model the final step can generally be broken down into two further steps, that of determining the grouping of information within the system, generally determining what are the basic objects about which information is being stored, and then determining the relationships between these group of information, or objects. The relational model for database management is a database model based on predicate logic and set theory. ...


The tree structure of data may enforce hierarchical model organization, with parent-child relationship table. In a hierarchical data model, data is organized into a tree-like structure. ...


Determining data to be stored

In a majority of cases, the person who is doing the design of a database is a person with expertise in the area of database design, rather than expertise in the domain from which the data to be stored is drawn e.g. financial information, biological information etc. Therefore the data to be stored in the database must be determined in cooperation with a person who does have expertise in that domain, and who is aware of what data must be stored within the system.


This process is one which is generally considered part of requirements analysis, and requires skill on the part of the database designer to elicit the needed information from those with the domain knowledge. This is because those with the necessary domain knowledge frequently cannot express clearly what their system requirements for the database are as they are unaccustomed to thinking in terms of the discrete data elements which must be stored. In systems engineering and software engineering, requirements analysis encompasses all of the tasks that go into the investigation, scoping and definition of a new or altered system. ...


Conceptual schema

Once a database designer is aware of the data which is to be stored within the database, they must then determine how the various pieces of that data relate to one another. When performing this step, the designer is generally looking out for the dependencies in the data, where one piece of information is dependent upon another i.e. when one piece of information changes, the other will also. For example, in a list of names and addresses, the address is dependent upon the name, because if the name is different then the associated address is different too. However, the inverse is not necessarily true, i.e. when the address changes name may be the same. For example, assuming the normal situation where two people can have the same address, but one person cannot have two addresses. A conceptual schema, or High-level data model or conceptual data model, is a map of concepts and their relationships, for example, a conceptual schema for a karate studio would include abstractions such as student, belt, grading and tournament. ...


(NOTE: A common misconception is that the relational model is so called because of the stating of relationships between data elements therein. This is not true. The relational model is so named such because it is based upon the mathematical structures known as relations.) The relational model for database management is a database model based on predicate logic and set theory. ... In mathematics, a finitary relation is defined by one of the formal definitions given below. ...


Logically structuring data

Once the relationships and dependencies amongst the various pieces of information have been determined, it is possible to arrange the data into a logical structure which can then be mapped into the storage objects with the database management system. In the case of relational databases the storage objects are tables which store data in rows and columns. A database management system (DBMS) is a system or software designed to manage a database, and run operations on the data requested by numerous clients. ... A relational database is a database based on the relational model. ... A table can be the basic component of a relational database (RDB). ...


The way this mapping is generally performed is such that each set of related data which depends upon a single object, whether real or abstract, is placed in a table. Relationships between these dependent objects is then stored as links between the various objects.


See also

In computer science, an entity-relationship model (ERM) is a model providing a high-level description of a conceptual data model. ... This article or section is in need of attention from an expert on the subject. ...

External links

  • SQL Recipes - A FREE resource for database designs and SQL queries

  Results from FactBites:
 
Database - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (3456 words)
Many professionals would consider a collection of data to constitute a database only if it has certain properties: for example, if the data is managed to ensure its integrity and quality, if it allows shared access by a community of users, if it has a schema, or if it supports a query language.
Database as a single word became common in Europe in the early 1970s and by the end of the decade it was being used in major American newspapers.
The flat (or table) model consists of a single, two-dimensional array of data elements, where all members of a given column are assumed to be similar values, and all members of a row are assumed to be related to one another.
Database administrator - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (1333 words)
Although not strictly part of a database administrator's duties, logical and physical design of databases is sometimes part of the job.
The backup of the database consists of data with timestamps combined with database logs to change the data to be consistent to a particular moment in time.
The recovery tests of the database consist of restoring the data, then applying logs against that data to bring the database backup to consistency at a particular point in time up to the last transaction in the logs.
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