Average Reviews:
(More customer reviews)I have to underscore a statement in the preface with which I am in total agreement: "This book can . . . be used by the advanced undergraduate or beginning graduate student to supplement a course textbook in introductory database management . . ." In fact, the authors point out that the fifth edition of this book has been split into a second work, PHYSICAL DATABASE DESIGN: THE DATABASE PROFESSIONAL'S GUIDE, 1st edition (a title that is not in print at the time of this review). As a book about "Logical Design," explaining WHY (not HOW) is the strength of the work. This is not a book one would primarily rely upon for developing an application. But it is an excellent work for giving solid background in the underpinnings of database design. The HOW (as the author's stated) is spawned off in another work, in this case.
I'm a non-professional IT person who has designed and implemented dozens of LAMP (Linux-Apache-MySQL-php) applications, and database design activities dating back to the 1980's, primarily in the honorable environment of the various MS-DOS flavors of the day. All of this with zero formal training (which isn't the same as NO training). With that background in mind, after going through this book I confirmed that I had picked up a lot of bad habits and developed a lot of good practices. My worst habit? A preference for flat databases over relational ones (see Chapter 8 - Object-Relational Design). My hardest earned (and confirmed by this book) good practice? The absolute importance of "requirements analysis," or, rigorous interviewing of the end user population to "determine exactly what the database is to be used for . . ." (see Chapter 4 - Requirements Analysis and Conceptual Data Modeling). In both of these cases this book was excellent in explaining WHY.
Since I work almost exclusively with web based databases now, I found Chapter 9 (XML and Web Databases) to contain one of the most concise and elegant explanations of XML I've ever read.
One annoying, but not fatal, flaw of this work: the quite serviceable index appears before the appendices, instead of the almost universal location of the last section of the book. I.e., when I turned to the back of the book to use the index, it wasn't where I expected. After a little fumbling, I did find it, but this is, in my opinion, a logical design flaw of the book.
I wouldn't hesitate to recommend this book as a purchase to an undergraduate MIS student even if it isn't a class requirement. This is a good book to develop a solid conceptual foundation. Also, since this book is primarily conceptual in its focus, it should have a shelf life much longer than works which focus on specific hardware and software which evolve continuously. Most of the concepts described in this book would have been relevant to me in my MS-DOS database days.
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Database systems and database design technology have undergone significant evolution in recent years. The relational data model and relational database systems dominate business applications; in turn, they are extended by other technologies like data warehousing, OLAP, and data mining. How do you model and design your database application in consideration of new technology or new business needs? In the extensively revised fifth edition, you'll get clear explanations, lots of terrific examples and an illustrative case, and the really practical advice you have come to count on--with design rules that are applicable to any SQL-based system. But you'll also get plenty to help you grow from a new database designer to an experienced designer developing industrial-sized systems.
In-depth detail and plenty of real-world, practical examples throughout
Loaded with design rules and illustrative case studies that are applicable to any SQL, UML, or XML-based system
Immediately useful to anyone tasked with the creation of data models for the integration of large-scale enterprise data.
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