HETT 205: DATABASE CONCEPTS

INDIVIDUAL ASSIGNMENT 2

Due: 16/07/20

Question 1

(a) Describe the relational model of data. [6 marks]

(b) Explain the following concepts in relational databases:

(i ) entity integrity constraint; [1 mark]

(ii ) foreign key and how it can specify a referential integrity constraint
between two relations; [4 marks]

(iii ) semantic integrity constraint. [1 mark]

(c) (i ) What is a functional dependency? [1 mark]

(ii ) Define Boyce-Codd Normal Form (BCNF). [3 marks]

(iii ) Define Third Normal Form (3NF). [3 marks]

(iv ) What is the relationship between BCNF and 3NF? [1 mark]

Question 2

(a) What is the difference between a key and a functional dependency? [3 marks]

(b) The schema R(A, B, C, D, E) has the following functional dependencies.

A, B → C
B, C → D
C, D → E
D, E → A

(i ) What are all of the keys of R? [3 marks]

(ii ) Which functional dependencies violate Boyce–Codd Normal form

(BCNF)? [3 marks]

(iii ) Which functional dependencies violate Third Normal form (3NF)?

[3 marks]

(iv ) Find a lossless-join decomposition of R into BCNF relations. [8 marks]

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Question 3

(a) Suppose that R(A, B, C) is a relational schema with functional dependencies

F = {A, B → C, C → B}.

(i ) Is this schema in 3NF? Explain. [2 marks]

(ii ) Is this schema in BCNF? Explain. [2 marks]

(b) Decomposition plays an important role in database design.

(i ) Define what is meant by a lossless-join decomposition. [2 marks]

(ii ) Define what is meant by a dependency preserving decomposition.

[2 marks]

(c) Let R(A, B, C, D, E) be a relational schema with the following functional

dependencies
A, B → C
D, E → C
B → D
(i ) What is the closure of {A, B}? [2 marks]

(ii ) What is the closure of {B, E}? [2 marks]

(iii ) Decompose the schema to BCNF in two different ways. In each case, are
all dependencies preserved? Explain. [4 + 4 marks]
Question 4

(a) Define the operators in the (core) relational algebra. [6 marks]

(b) The core relational algebra is often extended with other operators. For the
following operators give a definition and an example of their behaviour:

(i ) the full outer join operator; [3 marks]

(ii ) the aggregate and grouping operator. [5 marks]

(c) X, Y and Z are all relations with a single attribute A. A naı̈ve user wishes
to compute the set-theoretic expression X ∩ (Y ∪ Z) and writes the following
SQL query.

SELECT X.A
FROM X,Y,Z
WHERE X.A=Y.A OR X.A=Z.A

(i ) Give the relational algebra term that this query would be compiled to.
[2 marks]

(ii ) Does the SQL query satisfy the user’s expectation? Justify your answer.
[4 marks]
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Question 5

Assume a simple movie database with the following schema. (You may assume
that producers have a unique certification number, Cert, that is also recorded in
the Movie relation as attribute prodC#; and no two movies are produced with the
same title.)

Movie(title,year,length,prodC#)
StarsIn(movieTitle,movieYear,starName)
Producer(name,address,cert)
MovieStar(name,gender,birthdate)

(a) Write the following queries in SQL:

(i ) Who were the male stars in the film The Red Squirrel ? [1 mark]

(ii ) Which movies are longer than Titanic? [2 marks]

(b) SQL has a boolean-valued operator IN such that the expression s IN R is true
when s is contained in the relation R (assume for simplicity that R is a single
attribute relation and hence s is a simple atomic value).

Consider the following nested SQL query that uses the IN operator:

SELECT name
FROM Producer
WHERE cert IN (SELECT prodC#
FROM Movie
WHERE title IN (SELECT movieTitle
FROM StarsIn
WHERE starName='Nancho Novo'));

(i ) State concisely what this query is intended to mean. [1 mark]

(ii ) Express this nested query as a single SELECT-FROM-WHERE query.

[2 marks]

(iii ) Is your query from part (b)(ii ) always equivalent to the original query? If
yes, then justify your answer; if not, then explain the difference and show
how they could be made equivalent. [6 marks]

(c) SQL has a boolean-valued operator EXISTS such that EXISTS R is true if and
only if R is not empty.

Show how EXISTS is, in fact, redundant by giving a simple SQL expression
that is equivalent to EXISTS R but does not involve EXISTS or any cardinality
operators, e.g. COUNT. [Hint: You may use the IN operator.] [8 marks]

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Question 6

(a) OLAP and OLTP.

(i ) What is on-line transaction processing (OLTP)? [2 marks]

(ii ) What is on-line analytic processing (OLAP)? [2 marks]

(iii ) If you were designing a relational database system, how would your
approach to schema design differ for OLTP and OLAP systems?
[3 marks]

(iv ) In OLAP, what is the meaning of the terms drill down, roll up, and slice?
[3 marks]

(v ) What is a star schema? [1 mark]

(b) Suppose we have the following relational schema,

Supplier(sid:integer, name:string, postcode:string)

Parts(pid:integer, name:string, description:string)
SuppliedBy(sid:integer, pid:integer, weight:integer)

where the underlined attributes represent the primary keys of the associated
relation. The table SuppliedBy implements a relationship between suppliers
and parts — indicating which parts are supplied by which supplier — using
foreign keys pointing into the Parts and Supplier tables. The weight attribute
is the parts weight in grams.

Write an SQL query that will return a list, without duplicates, of all postcodes
associated with suppliers of parts less than one kilogram in weight. [5 marks]

(c) Define and explain the ACID properties of database transactions. [4 marks]