Chapter Six

Relational Query
Languages
 Chapter Six - Objectives
Meaning of the term relational completeness and
relational Languages.
How to form queries in relational algebra.

How to form queries in tuple relational calculus.

How to form queries in domain relational calculus.

Categories of relational DML.

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 Introduction
Relational algebra and relational calculus are
formal languages associated with the relational
model.
Informally, relational algebra is a procedural
language and relational calculus a non-
procedural language(high-level) . (procedural?
Non-procedural?)
However, formally both are equivalent to one
another.
A language that produces a relation that can be
derived using relational calculus is relationally
complete.
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 Relational Algebra
Relational algebra operations work on one or more
relations to define another relation without
changing the original relations.

Both operands and results are relations, so output

from one operation can become input to another
operation.

Allows expressions to be nested, just as in

arithmetic. This property is called closure.

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 Relational Algebra
Five basic operations in relational algebra:
Selection, Projection, Cartesian product, Union,
and Set Difference.

These perform most of the data retrieval

operations needed.

Also have Join, Intersection, and Division

operations, which can be expressed in terms of the
5 basic operations.

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 Relational Algebra Operations

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 Relational Algebra Operations

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 Consider these relations

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 Selection (or Restriction)
predicate (R)
Works on a single relation R and defines a relation that
contains only those tuples (rows) of R that satisfy the
specified condition (predicate).
 T1  predicate (R) =>renaming opertion

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 Example - Selection (or
Restriction)
List all staff with a salary greater than £10,000.

salary > 10000 (Staff)

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 Projection
col1, . . . , coln(R)
Works on a single relation R and defines a relation that
contains a vertical subset of R, extracting the values of
specified attributes and eliminating duplicates.

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 Example - Projection
Produce a list of salaries for all staff, showing only
staffNo, fName, lName, and salary details.
staffNo, fName, lName, salary(Staff)

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 Union
R  S
Union of two relations R and S defines a relation
that contains all the tuples of R, or S, or both R and
S, duplicate tuples being eliminated.
R and S must be union-compatible.
 i.e. Have equal number and type of attributes

If R and S have I and J tuples, respectively, union is

obtained by concatenating them into one relation
with a maximum of (I + J) tuples.

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 Example - Union
List all cities where there is either a branch office or a
property for rent.
city(Branch)  city(PropertyForRent)

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 Set Difference
R – S
Defines a relation consisting of the tuples that are in
relation R, but not in S.
R and S must be union-compatible.

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 Example - Set Difference
List all cities where there is a branch office but no
properties for rent.
city(Branch) – city(PropertyForRent)

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 Intersection
R  S
Defines a relation consisting of the set of all tuples
that are in both R and S.
R and S must be union-compatible.

Expressed using basic operations:

R  S = R – (R – S)

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 Example - Intersection
List all cities where there is both a branch office and at
least one property for rent.
city(Branch)  city(PropertyForRent)

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 Cartesian product
R X S
Defines a relation that is the concatenation of every tuple
of relation R with every tuple of relation S.

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 Example - Cartesian product
 List the names and comments of all clients who have
viewed a property for rent.
(clientNo, fName, lName(Client)) X (clientNo, propertyNo, comment
(Viewing))

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 Example - Cartesian product and
Selection
 Use selection operation to extract those tuples where
Client.clientNo = Viewing.clientNo.
sClient.clientNo = Viewing.clientNo((ÕclientNo, fName, lName(Client))  (ÕclientNo,
propertyNo, comment(Viewing)))

 Cartesian product and Selection can be reduced to a single operation called a Join.

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 Join Operations
Join is a derivative of Cartesian product and Selection.

Equivalent to performing a Selection, using join

predicate as selection formula, over Cartesian product
of the two operand relations.

One of the most difficult operations to implement

efficiently in an RDBMS and one reason why RDBMSs
have intrinsic performance problems.

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 Join Operations
Various forms of join operation
Theta join
Equijoin (a particular type of Theta join)
Natural join
Outer join
Semijoin

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 Theta join (-join)
R p S
Defines a relation that contains tuples satisfying the
predicate p from the Cartesian product of R and S.
The predicate p is of the form R.ai  S.bi where  may
be one of the comparison operators (<, , >, , =, ),
and ai & bi are attributes of R and S Respectively

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 Theta join (-join)
Can rewrite Theta join using basic Selection and
Cartesian product operations.

R F S = F(R  S)

 Degree of a Theta join is sum of degrees of the

operand relations R and S. If predicate F contains
only equality (=), the term Equijoin is used.
 The cardinality? ?

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 Example - Equijoin
List the names and comments of all clients who have
viewed a property for rent.
(clientNo, fName, lName(Client)) Client.clientNo = Viewing.clientNo (clientNo,
propertyNo, comment(Viewing))

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 Natural join
R S
An Equijoin of the two relations R and S over all common
attributes x. One occurrence of each common attribute is
eliminated from the final result.

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 Example - Natural join
List the names and comments of all clients who have
viewed a property for rent.
(clientNo, fName, lName(Client))
(clientNo, propertyNo, comment(Viewing))

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 Outer joins
 To display rows in the result that do not have matching values in the join column
(common Column as in the natural join, use Outer join.

R S Left Outer Join

 (Left) outer join is join in which tuples from R that do not have matching values
in common columns of S are also included in result relation.
R S Right Outer Join
 Right outer join is join in which tuples from S that do not have matching values
in common columns of R are also included in result relation.
R⟗ S Full Outer
 Full outer join is join in which tuples from both R and S that do not have
matching values in common columns of S and R respectively are also included
in result relation.

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 Example - Left Outer join
Produce a status report on property viewings.

propertyNo, street, city(PropertyForRent)

Viewing

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 Semijoin
R F S
Defines a relation that contains the tuples of R that
participate in the join of R with S.

 Can rewrite Semi-join using Projection and Join:

R F S = A(R F S)
Where A is the set of attributes of R

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 Example - Semijoin
List complete details of all staffs who work at the branch
in Glasgow.
Staff Staff.branchNo=Branch.branchNo (city=‘Glasgow’(Branch))

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 Exercise
 Consider these tables
Customer( CustId, custname,City,TelNo)
Guarantor( GId, Gname, City, TelNo)
Loan( LoanId, LoanDate, LoanAmount, DueDate, CustId, Gid)
#Write the Tuple Relational Calculus Expression to answer
the Following Queries
1.List all Cities where there is either a customer or a guarantor.
2. List all Customers who have taken a loan amount of more
than 50,000
3. Produce a list with guarantor name, customer name and
LoanAmount information for those loans the amount of which
is more than 1,000,000.
4. List all Guarantors with their Name and Telephone Numbers
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 Division
R  S
Defines a relation over the attributes C that consists of set
of tuples from R that match combination of every tuple in
S.

Expressed using basic operations:

T1  C(R)
T2  C((S X T1) – R)
T  T1 – T2

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 Example - Division
Identify all clients who have viewed all( Combination of
all property for rents) properties with three rooms.

(clientNo, propertyNo(Viewing)) 
(propertyNo(rooms = 3 (PropertyForRent)))

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 Aggregate Operations
AL(R)
Applies aggregate function list, AL, to R to define a
relation over the aggregate list.
AL contains one or more (<aggregate_function>,
<attribute>) pairs .
Main aggregate functions are: COUNT, SUM, AVG,
MIN, and MAX.
Two types of aggregates
Scalar- no grouping
Vector- has grouping

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Example – Aggregate Operations
 How many properties cost more than £350 per month to
rent?

R(myCount) COUNT propertyNo (σrent > 350

(PropertyForRent))

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 Grouping Operation
 AL(R)
GA
Groups tuples of R by grouping attributes, GA, and then
applies aggregate function list, AL, to define a new
relation.
AL contains one or more (<aggregate_function>,
<attribute>) pairs.
Resulting relation contains the grouping attributes, GA,
along with results of each of the aggregate functions.

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 Example – Grouping Operation
 Find the number of staff working in each branch and
the sum of their salaries.

R(branchNo, myCount, mySum)

branchNo  COUNT staffNo, SUM salary (Staff)

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 Relational Calculus
Relational calculus query specifies what is to be
retrieved rather than how to retrieve it.
No description of how to evaluate a query.

In first-order logic (or predicate calculus), predicate is

a truth-valued function with arguments.
When we substitute values for the arguments, function
yields an expression, called a proposition, which can be
either true or false.

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 Relational Calculus
If predicate contains a variable (e.g. ‘x is a member of
staff’), there must be a range for x.
When we substitute some values of this range for x,
proposition may be true; for other values, it may be
false.
When applied to databases, relational calculus has
two forms: tuple and domain.

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 Tuple Relational Calculus
Interested in finding tuples for which a predicate is
true. Based on use of tuple variables.
Tuple variable is a variable that ‘ranges over’ a
named relation: i.e., variable whose only permitted
values are tuples of the relation.
Specify range of a tuple variable S as the Staff
relation as:
Staff(S)
To find set of all tuples S such that P(S) is true:
{S | P(S)}

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 Tuple Relational Calculus - Example
To find details of all staff earning more than
£10,000:
{S | Staff(S)  S.salary > 10000}

To find a particular attribute, such as salary, write:

{S.salary | Staff(S)  S.salary > 10000}

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 Tuple Relational Calculus
Can use two quantifiers to tell how many instances the
predicate applies to:
Existential quantifier $ (‘there exists’)
Universal quantifier " (‘for all’)

Tuple variables qualified by " or $ are called bound

variables, otherwise called free variables.

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 Tuple Relational Calculus
Existential quantifier used in formulae that must
be true for at least one instance, such as:
Staff(S) Ù ($B)(Branch(B) Ù
(B.branchNo = S.branchNo) Ù B.city = ‘London’)

Means ‘There exists a Branch tuple with same

branchNo as the branchNo of the current Staff
tuple, S, and is located in London’.

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 Tuple Relational Calculus
Universal quantifier is used in statements about every
instance, such as:
("B) (B.city  ‘Paris’)

Means ‘For all Branch tuples, the address is not in

Paris’.

Can also use ~($B) (B.city = ‘Paris’) which means

‘There are no branches with an address in Paris’.

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 Tuple Relational Calculus
Formulae should be unambiguous and make sense.
A (well-formed) formula is made out of atoms:
R(S ), where S is a tuple variable and R is a relation
i i
S .a q S .a
i 1 j 2
S .aqc
i 1
Can recursively build up formulae from atoms:
An atom is a formula
If F and F are formulae, so are their conjunction, F Ù
1 2 1
F2; disjunction, F1 Ú F2; and negation, ~F1
If F is a formula with free variable X, then ($X)(F) and
("X)(F) are also formulae.
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 Example - Tuple Relational Calculus
 List the names of all managers who earn more than
£25,000.

{S.fName, S.lName | Staff(S) 

S.position = ‘Manager’  S.salary > 25000}

 List the staff who manage properties for rent in

Glasgow.

{S | Staff(S)  ($P) (PropertyForRent(P)  (P.staffNo =

S.staffNo) Ù P.city = ‘Glasgow’)}

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 Example - Tuple Relational Calculus
 List the names of staff who currently do not manage
any properties.

{S.fName, S.lName | Staff(S)  (~($P)

(PropertyForRent(P)(S.staffNo = P.staffNo)))}
Or
{S.fName, S.lName | Staff(S)  ((P) (~PropertyForRent(P)
 ~(S.staffNo = P.staffNo)))}

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 Example - Tuple Relational Calculus
List the names of clients who have viewed a
property for rent in Glasgow.
{C.fName, C.lName | Client(C) Ù (($V)($P)
(Viewing(V) Ù PropertyForRent(P) Ù
(C.clientNo = V.clientNo) Ù
(V.propertyNo=P.propertyNo) Ù
P.city =‘Glasgow’))}

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 Tuple Relational Calculus
Expressions can generate an infinite set.
For example:
{S | ~Staff(S)}

To avoid this, add restriction that all values in result

must be values in the domain of the expression. i.e
Domain /Range must be specified for every tuple
variable. The above doesn’t specify a range.

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 Domain Relational Calculus
Uses variables that take values from
domains( Columns) instead of tuples of relations.

If F(d1, d2, . . . , dn) stands for a formula composed of

atoms and d1, d2, . . . , dn represent domain variables,
then:
{d1, d2, . . . , dn | F(d1, d2, . . . , dn)}
is a general domain relational calculus expression.

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 Example - Domain Relational Calculus
 Find the names of all managers who earn more than
£25,000.
{fN, lN | ($sN, posn, sex, DOB, sal, bN)
(Staff (sN, fN, lN, posn, sex, DOB, sal, bN) 
posn = ‘Manager’  sal > 25000)}

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 Example - Domain Relational Calculus
 List the staffs who manage properties for rent in
Glasgow.

{sN, fN, lN, posn, sex, DOB, sal, bN |

($sN1,cty)(Staff(sN,fN,lN,posn,sex,DOB,sal,bN) 
PropertyForRent(pN, st, cty, pc, typ, rms,
rnt, oN, sN1, bN1) Ù
(sN=sN1) Ù cty=‘Glasgow’)}

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 Example - Domain Relational Calculus
 List the names of staff who currently do not
manage any properties for rent.

{fN, lN | ($sN)
(Staff(sN,fN,lN,posn,sex,DOB,sal,bN) 
(~($sN1) (PropertyForRent(pN, st, cty, pc, typ,
rms, rnt, oN, sN1, bN1) Ù (sN=sN1))))}

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 Example - Domain Relational Calculus
 List the names of clients who have viewed a
property for rent in Glasgow.

{fN, lN | ($cN, cN1, pN, pN1, cty)

(Client(cN, fN, lN,tel, pT, mR) 
Viewing(cN1, pN1, dt, cmt) 
PropertyForRent(pN, st, cty, pc, typ,
rms, rnt,oN, sN, bN) Ù
(cN = cN1) Ù (pN = pN1) Ù cty = ‘Glasgow’)}

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 Domain Relational Calculus
Every relational algebra expression has an
equivalent relational calculus expression, and vice
versa.

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 Other Languages
Transform-oriented languages are non-procedural
languages that use relations to transform input data
into required outputs (e.g. SQL).

Graphical languages provide user with picture of the

structure of the relation. User fills in example of what is
wanted and system returns required data in that
format (e.g. QBE).

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 Other Languages
4GLs can create complete customized application
using limited set of commands in a user-friendly,
often menu-driven environment.

Some systems accept a form of natural language,

sometimes called a 5GL, although this development is
still at an early stage.

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