The Relational Data Model and

Relational Database Constraints

 Chapter Outline
 Relational Model Concepts
 Relational Model Constraints and Relational Database
Schemas
 Update Operations and Dealing with Constraint
Violations
 Relational Model Concepts
 The relational Model of Data is based on the
concept of a Relation.

 A Relation is a mathematical concept based on the

ideas of sets.

 The strength of the relational approach to data

management comes from the formal foundation
provided by the theory of relations.

 We review the essentials of the relational approach

in this chapter.
 Relational Model Concepts
 The model was first proposed by Dr. E.F. Codd of
IBM in 1970 in the following paper:
"A Relational Model for Large Shared Data
Banks," Communications of the ACM, June 1970.
 INFORMAL DEFINITIONS
 RELATION: A table of values

– A relation may be thought of as a set of rows.

– A relation may alternately be though of as a set of columns.
– Each row represents a fact that corresponds to a real-world entity or
relationship.
– Each row has a value of an item or set of items that uniquely
identifies that row in the table.
– Sometimes row-ids or sequential numbers are assigned to identify the
rows in the table.
– Each column typically is called by its column name or column header
or attribute name.
 FORMAL DEFINITIONS
 A Relation may be defined in multiple ways.
 The Schema of a Relation: R (A1, A2, .....An)
Relation schema R is defined over attributes A1, A2, .....An
For Example -
CUSTOMER (Cust-id, Cust-name, Address, Phone#)

Here, CUSTOMER is a relation defined over the four

attributes Cust-id, Cust-name, Address, Phone#, each of
which has a domain or a set of valid values. For example,
the domain of Cust-id is 6 digit numbers.
 FORMAL DEFINITIONS
 A tuple is an ordered set of values
 Each value is derived from an appropriate domain.
 Each row in the CUSTOMER table may be referred to as a
tuple in the table and would consist of four values.
 <632895, "John Smith", "101 Main St. Atlanta, GA 30332", "(404) 894-2000">

is a tuple belonging to the CUSTOMER relation.

 A relation may be regarded as a set of tuples (rows).
 Columns in a table are also called attributes of the relation.
 FORMAL DEFINITIONS
 A domain has a logical definition: e.g.,
“USA_phone_numbers” are the set of 10 digit phone
numbers valid in the U.S.
 A domain may have a data-type or a format defined for it.
The USA_phone_numbers may have a format: (ddd)-ddd-
dddd where each d is a decimal digit. E.g., Dates have
various formats such as monthname, date, year or yyyy-mm-
dd, or dd mm,yyyy etc.
 An attribute designates the role played by the domain. E.g.,
the domain Date may be used to define attributes “Invoice-
date” and “Payment-date”.
 FORMAL DEFINITIONS
 The relation is formed over the cartesian product of the sets;
each set has values from a domain; that domain is used in a
specific role which is conveyed by the attribute name.
 For example, attribute Cust-name is defined over the domain
of strings of 25 characters. The role these strings play in the
CUSTOMER relation is that of the name of customers.
 Formally,
Given R(A1, A2, .........., An)
r(R)  dom (A1) X dom (A2) X ....X dom(An)
 R: schema of the relation
 r of R: a specific "value" or population of R.
 R is also called the intension of a relation
 r is also called the extension of a relation
 FORMAL DEFINITIONS
 Let S1 = {0,1}
 Let S2 = {a,b,c}

 Let R  S1 X S2

 Then for example: r(R) = {<0,a> , <0,b> , <1,c> }

is one possible “state” or “population” or
“extension” r of the relation R, defined over domains
S1 and S2. It has three tuples.
 DEFINITION SUMMARY
Informal Terms Formal Terms

Table Relation
Column Attribute/Domain
Row Tuple
Values in a column Domain
Table Definition Schema of a Relation
Populated Table Extension
Example - Figure 5.1
 CHARACTERISTICS OF RELATIONS
 Ordering of tuples in a relation r(R): The tuples are not
considered to be ordered, even though they appear to be in
the tabular form.
 Ordering of attributes in a relation schema R (and of
values within each tuple): We will consider the attributes
in R(A1, A2, ..., An) and the values in t=<v1, v2, ..., vn> to be
ordered .
(However, a more general alternative definition of
relation does not require this ordering).
 Values in a tuple: All values are considered atomic
(indivisible). A special null value is used to represent
values that are unknown or inapplicable to certain tuples.
 CHARACTERISTICS OF RELATIONS

 Notation:
- We refer to component values of a tuple t
by t[Ai] = vi (the value of attribute Ai for
tuple t).
Similarly, t[Au, Av, ..., Aw] refers to the
subtuple of t containing the values of
attributes Au, Av, ..., Aw, respectively.
CHARACTERISTICS OF RELATIONS-
Figure 5.2
 Relational Integrity Constraints

 Constraints are conditions that must hold

on all valid relation instances. There are
three main types of constraints:
1. Key constraints
2. Entity integrity constraints
3. Referential integrity constraints
 Key Constraints
 Superkey of R: A set of attributes SK of R such that no
two tuples in any valid relation instance r(R) will have
the same value for SK. That is, for any distinct tuples t1
and t2 in r(R), t1[SK]  t2[SK].
 Key of R: A "minimal" superkey; that is, a superkey K
such that removal of any attribute from K results in a set
of attributes that is not a superkey.
Example: The CAR relation schema:
CAR(State, Reg#, SerialNo, Make, Model, Year)
has two keys Key1 = {State, Reg#}, Key2 = {SerialNo}, which are also
superkeys. {SerialNo, Make} is a superkey but not a key.
 If a relation has several candidate keys, one is chosen
arbitrarily to be the primary key. The primary key
attributes are underlined.
Key Constraints
5.4
 Entity Integrity
 Relational Database Schema: A set S of relation schemas
that belong to the same database. S is the name of the
database.
S = {R1, R2, ..., Rn}
 Entity Integrity: The primary key attributes PK of each
relation schema R in S cannot have null values in any tuple
of r(R). This is because primary key values are used to
identify the individual tuples.
t[PK]  null for any tuple t in r(R)
 Note: Other attributes of R may be similarly constrained
to disallow null values, even though they are not members
of the primary key.
 Referential Integrity
 A constraint involving two relations (the previous
constraints involve a single relation).
 Used to specify a relationship among tuples in two
relations: the referencing relation and the referenced
relation.
 Tuples in the referencing relation R1 have attributes FK
(called foreign key attributes) that reference the primary
key attributes PK of the referenced relation R2. A tuple t1
in R1 is said to reference a tuple t2 in R2 if t1[FK] = t2[PK].
 A referential integrity constraint can be displayed in a
relational database schema as a directed arc from R 1.FK to
R2.
 Referential Integrity
Constraint
Statement of the constraint
The value in the foreign key column (or columns)
FK of the the referencing relation R1 can be either:
(1) a value of an existing primary key value of the
corresponding primary key PK in the referenced
relation R2,, or..
(2) a null.
In case (2), the FK in R1 should not be a part of its own
primary key.
Other Types of Constraints
Semantic Integrity Constraints:
- based on application semantics and cannot be
expressed by the model per se
- E.g., “the max. no. of hours per employee for all
projects he or she works on is 56 hrs per week”
- A constraint specification language may have
to be used to express these
- SQL-99 allows triggers and ASSERTIONS to
allow for some of these
5.5
5.6
5.7
 Update Operations on Relations
 INSERT a tuple.
 DELETE a tuple.
 MODIFY a tuple.

 Integrity constraints should not be violated by the update

operations.
 Several update operations may have to be grouped
together.
 Updates may propagate to cause other updates
automatically. This may be necessary to maintain integrity
constraints.
 Update Operations on Relations
 In case of integrity violation, several actions can
be taken:
– Cancel the operation that causes the violation (REJECT
option)
– Perform the operation but inform the user of the
violation
– Trigger additional updates so the violation is corrected
(CASCADE option, SET NULL option)
– Execute a user-specified error-correction routine