Databases Design

Databases design

This presentation is not a comprehensive course on database design, but rather a preliminary approach to clarifying the processes and concepts necessary to create coherent databases.

The approach and the vocabulary used here are intended for non-specialist readers, without removing the concepts essential to the design process: "Ce qui se conçoit bien s'énonce clairement, et les mots pour le dire arrivent aisément"... (Boileau)

The approach and tool (see below) are not 'toy' applications and are capable of building and managing real relational databases.

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Comments, in green, are specially dedicated to "database purists".
The design method, presented hereafter, is easy to use (by everybody) and operationally. Easy doesn't mean it's simplistic. This method, like all relational database design methods, relies on the work of Codd (1970) and Date (1975) and follows the recommendations of the ANSI-SPARK workshop group (1975). Only the unnecessarily verbose aspect of the "traditional" methods has been intentionally withdrawn.
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IBEasy+, software developed by the author allows you to:

  1. Apply, practically, the database design stages presented in these pages
  2. Design and use "easily" relational databases

The reader, more interested in the formal aspects can see, in these pages, the item "Normalization of relations". See also the book of C. J. Date.

Fundamentals of Database

This presentation is not a complete course on databases design, but an initial approach to clarify the process and concepts required to construct coherent databases.

Differences on... Spreadsheet Database
Main use Calculations Data management and processing
Structuring of data None Structuring and high coherency.
Integrity Controls of data None Strict control of the potential values of each data.
Access to data Single user Multi users
Data confidentiality No control Verification of access privileges for each user.
Data size -One table
-Some dozens of rows
-Several tables
-Several thousands of rows by table
Processing of data Quantitative Qualitative and quantitative
Interrogations of data Realized by specific procedures "Universal" language : SQL
Databases design

The design of a Database, implies 3 fundamental steps:

  1. Analyzing documents: construction of the data dictionary.
  2. Structuring of the data dictionary: determination of entities and associations.
  3. Linking entities together: the diagram of data. 
Problems with incorrect modeling

When modeling has not been done correctly, different problems may appear.