ASSESSEMENT and ASSIGNMENT BRIEF

Unit 17 : Database Design Concepts

Learning Hours: 45 Hours
Course: HND CSD Level 4
Term:
Lecturer: Mohammed Hasan

UNIT CODE: R/601/0447

S elf-learning hours: 90 hours
Credits: 15
Verifier:

Learners Name
Sarmila Sriharan
Registration Number
HNDCSD9816
Learners Declaration: I certify that the work submitted for this unit is my own:
Signed:
Hand out Date: 30/09/2013
Submission Date: 18/01/14
The Following Sections to be completed by the assessor:
Center Name:
UKCBC
Center Number:
Please note that the assessors signature below denotes conformation that he/she has in no
way influenced the outcome of the assessment:
Assessors Name:
Assessors Signature:
Has the unit been Internally Verified?
Date of verification:
Internal verifiers signature:
Internal verifiers assignment brief:

Y/N

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Task No.

Description

Task - 1

P1.1 Analyse the Key Issues and Application of Databases

within Organisational Environments

03

P1.2 Critically Evaluate the Features and Advantages of

Database Management Systems

P2.1- Analyse a Database Developmental Methodology

12

P2.2- Discuss Entity-Relationship Modelling and Normalisation

17

Task - 2

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No.

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LO1 UNDERSTAND DATABASES AND DATA MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS

P1.1 Analyse the Key Issues And Application Of Databases Within Organisational
Environments
DATABASE MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS (DBMS)
A database is a collection of related information and storing for future purpose. Database
Management is an important aspect of data processing. It involves, several data models
evolving into different DBMS software packages. Some commercially available DBMS are
INGRES, ORACLE, and Sybase.
ADVANTAGES OF DBMS
Data were processed using file processing system before DBMS
1. User is not required to write the procedures for managing the database.
2. It provides an abstract view of data that hides the details.
3. It is efficient to use
4. It takes care of Concurrent access using some form of locking.
5. It has crash recovery mechanism
6. It has a good protection mechanism if the system fails. (elearning.vtu.ac.in)
KEY ISSUES OF DBMS:
The key issues of DBMS such as:
(ijarcce.com, Vol. 2, Issue 7, July 2013)
1. Centralised Control
In DBMS all the data of the organization is joined into the single database. This
database is under the control of a central database management system (DBMS) in
which storage devices are not all attached to a Common Central Processing unit
(CPU). It may be stored in multiple computers located in the same physical location,
or may be dispersed over a network of interconnected computers.
2. Data redundancy
Data redundancy means duplication of data. Database are created in the system,
the same data may have to be recorded and stored in many files. So in that case the
repetition of information about an entity cannot be avoided. (elearning.ukcbc.co.uk,
Further Reading DBMS PDF)
For Example: personal file and payroll file, both contain data on employee name,
designation etc.

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DBMS avoids unnecessary duplication of data and effectively reduces the total
amount of data storage required.
3. Sharing Data
This allows the user could share data like any number of application programs under
its control. That means accessing the data by multiple users at same time.
4. Concurrency Problems
When more than one user is allowed to process the database and if in that case two or more
users try to update a shared data element at about the same time then it may result into
inconsistent data. (ijarcce.com, Vol. 2, Issue 7, July 2013)
5. Backup and Recovery
It provides recovery and backup from the failures like disk crash, power failure etc which
help to recover the database from inconsistent state.
ACID TRANSACTIONS:
An ACID transaction is a sequence of database operations that has the following properties:
1. Atomicity
Any hardware or power failure, during the transaction is not able to complete the
process and its going back to the starting level of transaction. ( msdn.microsoft.com)
2. Consistency
At the end of any consistency, the DBM systems will confirming that it is in a valid
state.
For Example: A transaction maps a correct database state to another correct state
3. Data Isolation
Many simultaneous transactions could happen without disturbing each other.
4. Durability
: After the transaction has been successfully completed; all of the changes it made to
the system are permanent (elearning.ukcbc.co.uk,ACID Properties file)

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APPLICATION AREAS OF DATABASE SYSTEM

Database systems are widely used in different areas because of their various advantages.
Some of the most common database applications are listed here.
(safaribooksonline.com/book/databases)
1. Banking
Banks use databases for customer inquiry, accounts, loans, and other transactions.
The database is well designed and its control all the branches customer transaction
and other operations. The bank data has been normalised by their customer details
for required query.
For example: The clients make deposits and withdrawals from a local branch cash
machine, this deposits are checked locally and balanced and transactions from each
branch are transmitted to a headquarters or regional location for processing by
DBMS. (safaribooksonline.com/book/databases)
2. Education
In education department has the centralised DBM system for all their purposes.
Schools and colleges use databases for course registration, result, and other
information. The DBM systems are used to manage student and staff information
across all areas of school life including registration, finance (fees) and payroll,
timetabling, progress tracking and assessment, and whole-school communication in
the form of e-mails or chat. This DBMS helps them to access and maintaing the
details quick and safely. (safaribooksonline.com/book/databases)
3. Hospital
In hospital the databases are used for maintaining the patient health care details,
doctors details, appointments and salary details of the employees. The database
helps them to give good service to the patients and others.
4. E-commerce
Online sales have a huge development in recent years. The databases are used to
store product, customer and transaction details. Moreover, databases are used for
keeping track of online payment and purchases on credit cards in order to generate
monthly statements (techterms.com)

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Human Resources
The HR department use databases for storing information about their employees,
salaries,

benefits,

taxes,

and

for

generating

salary

checks.

(safaribooksonline.com/book/databases)

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P1.2 CRITICALLY EVALUATE THE FEATURES AND ADVANTAGES OF DATABASE

MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS
FEATURES OF DBMS
(elearning.ukcbc.co.uk, Features of DBMS PDF) A good DBMS will have some features to
deliver good services, such as
1. Tools for the Administration
a) Remote Control
b) Operating tool Control
c) Lo2.1ading tool Load
d) Administration tool
e) Domain
2. Tools for the Microsoft Windows environment
a) ODBC driver
3. Tools for the Internet / Intranet
a) Perl interface
b) JDBC driver
c) Open interfaces
d) GUI Query
e) Programming tool SQL-PL
f)

CALL interface (ODBC on UNIX and Linux)

g) Pre-compilers
h) TCL/TK interface
Lets see some of the above features of DBMS
1. Remote Control
Remote access is access between an organizational information system and a user
communicating through an external, non-organization controlled network (e.g., the
Internet).
Remote Control supports remote administration of many database servers providing
a convenient graphical interface. Also it supports the important tasks such as starting
and stopping, monitoring, backup, recovery and complex tasks can be performed
with Control. (elearning.ukcbc.co.uk, Features of DBMS PDF)
2. Overview of Open Database Connectivity (ODBC) Driver

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ODBC is an industry standard application program interface (API) that provides a

solution to a common problem.
A driver is a dynamic link library (DLL) that implements ODBC function calls and
interacts with a data source. The ODBC driver allows database to be accessed from
any Windows tools with an ODBC interface
For Example: Access, Excel, MS Query, Visual Basic, PowerBuilder, SQL and
Windows). (elearning.ukcbc.co.uk, Features of DBMS PDF)
3. GUI Query
GUI Query provides a Graphical User Interface (GUI) for creating SQL queries. This
includes a pane that displays user query graphically and text versions, so user can
click and drag while also seeing the results in SQL. The GUI Query can be used to
enter SQL statements interactively and to access the database catalogue. There is
the possibility to access the SQL Online Tutorial from.
GUI Query to perform the following tasks:
i.

Working with a graphical representation of a query or with SQL

ii.

Joining related tables -user could add more than one table to their query, it
determines how the tables are related and constructs the appropriate join
command.

iii.

Querying or updating databases - user can use GUI Query to return data by
using Transact-SQL SELECT statements and to create queries that update,
add, or delete records in a database.

iv.

Viewing and editing results immediately(elearning.ukcbc.co.uk, Features of

DBMS PDF)

4. Perl-Interface

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The Perl interface allows database to be accessed from the script language Perl
using the DBI access standard. In this way, complex Web applications can be
developed.
5. SQL-PL
SQL-PL is the language to use when writing code that resides in the database.
Another feature of PL/SQL is that it allows user to store compiled code directly in the
database. This supports any number of applications or users to share the same
functions and procedures. This can be used to create DB procedures, triggers, and
DB functions out of the development environment, and to test and operate them on
both the client server.
6. Trigger
The definition of the SQL trigger is stored in the database management system and
is invoked by the database management system, when the SQL table, that the trigger
is defined on, is modified. The trigger resides in the database and lets the user to
write a set of SQL statements that multiple applications can use. It lets the user to
avoid redundant code when multiple programs need to perform the same database
operation. The triggers are activated indirectly by means of the SQL statements
INSERT, UPDATE, and DELETE. (publib.boulder.ibm.com)
Triggers are commonly used to:
a) Audit changes
b) Improve changes
c) Enforce and excute business rules
d) Reproducing data
e) Enhance performance
ADVANTAGES OF DBMS
1. Reduction of Redundancies
Data redundancy means duplication of data. DBMS avoids unnecessary duplication
of data and effectively reduces the total amount of data storage required. It is also
eliminates the extra processing to trace the required data in a large mass of data.
Any redundancies that exist in the DBMS are controlled and the system ensures that
these multiple copies are stable. (elearning.ukcbc.co.uk, Further Reading DBMS
PDF)
2. Data integrity

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This means that the stored values in the data base should be accurate and must
satisfy some rules. Therefore, data values being entered for storage could be
checked to ensure that they stored within a specified range and correct format. Apply
various types of constraints like Primary Key, Foreign Key, Unique, NOT NULL,
Check for data integrity.
For example, the value for the age of an employee may be in the range of 16 and 75.
3. Conflict Resolution:
DBMS has the best file structure and access method to get best performance for the
response-critical applications, while permitting less critical applications to continue to
use die database, albeit with a relatively slower response.
4. Data Independence
Data independence is a form of database management that keeps data separated
from all programs that make use of it. In DBMS or database management system,
this independence ensures that the data cannot be redefined or reorganized by any
of the programs that make use of it. In this manner, the data remains accessible, but
it is also stable and cannot be corrupted by the applications.
5. Security And Access Control
Database should be protected from unauthorized users. Every user should not be
allowed to access every data. Since application programs are added to the system
For example: The Payroll Personnel in a bank should not be allowed to access
accounts information of the customers. (elearning.ukcbc.co.uk, Further Reading
DBMS PDF)
6. Data Availability
Data availability means that data continues to be available at a required level of
performance. Basically, the data availability is achieved through redundancy involving
where the data is stored and how it can be reached.
Data is one of the most critical business assets of an organization. If this data is not
available and/or not protected, companies may stand to lose millions of dollars in
business downtime as well as negative publicity.(elearning.ukcbc,Further Reading
DBMS PDF)

Availability comprises four distinct components, such as

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a) Manageability- Create and maintain an effective environment that delivers

service to users
b) Recoverability Rebuild service skills if the system failure
c) Reliability- Supply good service at specified levels for a stated period
d) Serviceability the ability to determine the existence of problems, analyse
their cause(s), and repair the problems
All four of these impact the overall availability of a system, database, or application.

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LO2 UNDERSTAND DATABASE DESIGN TECHNIQUES

P2.1- ANALYSE A DATABASE DEVELOPMENTAL METHODOLOGY SUCH AS SSADM
AND ITS PHASES FEASIBILITY STUDY, REQUIREMENT ANALYSIS, REQUIREMENT
SPECIFICATION, PHYSICAL DESIGN ETC.

DATABASE DEVELOPMENT
When designing a database the following properties are important for a good design and
implementation of the Database
a) Completeness - Ensure that users can access the data they want and any time or
any place
b) Integrity - Ensures that data is both consistent and correct that means no invalid data
c) Flexibility - Ensures that a database without requiring a lot of effort to satisfy
changing requirements
d) Efficiency - Good Response Time
e) Usability - Database must be easy to use
SSADM STRUCTURED SYSTEMS ANALYSIS AND DESIGN METHODOLOGY
SSADM is an analysis and design methodology. There is no implementation, maintenance,
testing and review of the Conventional Approach. This makes use of phases (stages) and
sub-phases, all exactly detailed. This allows project management tools to be used alongside
the methodology.( elearning.ukcbc.co.uk, Further Reading SSADM PDF)
IMPORTANT CHARACTERISTICS OF SSADM
a) Dividing a project into small modules with well defined objectives
b) Useful during requirements specification and system design stage
c) Diagrammatic representation and other useful modelling techniques
d) Simple and easily understood by clients and developers
e) Performing activities in a sequence
KEY BENEFITS OF SSADM
a) Teachable
b) Effective use of both experienced and inexperienced staff
c) Great resilience against loss of key staff
d) Improved involvement of end user over Conventional Approach
e) Earlier/better validation of stages of analysis and design
f)

More complete and less ambiguous specifications

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g) More maintainable systems

h) Improved management control of systems development
DISADVANTAGES OF SSADM
a) Causes the danger of over-analysing
b) It can be very time and cost consuming
c) With large systems, the outline diagram can become very unclear, because all
relevant data flows have to be included.
It recognises the following stages in the systems development lifecycle.

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1. Feasibility
In this stage involves a high level analysis of business area to fix the cost and technical
effective systems. Moreover, it is concerned about the project in planning is feasible to
all the possible ways like scope, requirements and compare with current options to
various alternatives. Systems investigation techniques, such as collect information by
contacting interviews of people at all levels of the organization; analyse questionnaires;
review short and long term plans, business manuals, files, forms, etc. and their data flow
diagrams. Entity models are drawn, but only in outline and in not too great detail.
This phase has 4 steps:
a) Prepare for the study- plan all possible way to develop a project
b) The scope of the project- analyse the requirements and scope of the project
c) Define the problem- identify the problems
d) Compares requirements with current position- consider the various alternatives
and recommend the best option from both the business and technical point of
view for the project
All this information is then published in the feasibility report.
2. Requirements Analysis
This stage investigates of current requirements and business system options. One of
these options will be chosen then refined in the later stages.
Current requirements
a) The feasibility stage is carried out very much in outline and the investigation of
current environment may have much less of a basis for the tasks at this stage.
b) In this stage the new system are examined along with investigating the current
processing methods and data of the current system.
c) Physical Data Flow Modelling and Logical Data Modelling can be used as
technique during this stage.
d) Catalogues will be created, such as the user catalogue, which lists the activities
carried out in each job, and the requirements catalogue, which lists the functional
and non-functional requirements.

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Business system options

The Business Systems Options, or BSO, stage allows the analyst to choose between a
numbers of business-system options that each describe the scope and functionality
provided by a particular development and implementation approach.
If the business system options are satisfying the requirements, and a few of these are
presented to management so that one can be chosen. This include outline of the cost,
development time scale, technical constraints, physical organisation, volumes, training
requirements, benefits and impacts on the organisation. The chosen option documented
in detail and agreed as the basis of the system specification which is the next stage.
A data flow diagrams (DFD) and Entityrelationship models are developed but this
stage is largely a specification in narrative.
3. Requirements Specification
This provides clear guidance to the design stages where investigation and analysis are
replaced by specification and design. The requirements catalogue will be analysed and
updated for the better design. Data Flow Modelling, Logical Data Modelling, Entity Event
Modelling and normalisation can be used as technique during this stage.
The inputs, outputs and events or enquiry triggers for each function are defined and
documented in detail usually on forms which give function name, description, error
handling, data flow diagram processes, events and input and output descriptions. At the
end of this stage the system objectives, the functions are checked and verified for the
completeness of definition and the full requirements specification documented.
4. Logical System Specifications
This specification has two stages such as:
a) Technical System Options
This stage result is the technical selected and detailed option. In this stage the
system environment such as hardware and software configure, development
strategy, organisational impact and system functionality are determined by the
analysts. This stage is a really rely on development or implementation specific,
because there are so many alternative hardware, software and implementation
strategies.
Hence this stage allows the analyst to consider the technical options and etails
such as the terms of cost, performance and impact on the organisation is
determined. The analyst should identify, define and select the possible technical
system option in this stage.

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b) Logical Design
In this stage a detailed logical pattern mainly containing the data and the
procedures plan is explained. (www.sqa.org.uk/e-learning)
a) The data plan is made by using the normalization entities data base
technique.
b) The procedures plan is made by enlarging several detailed processes
outlines.
c) The data and the procedures plans are made simultaneously.
d) User involvement is recommended at this stage and samples which are
developed in stage 3 will be referred to current. Moreover, the further
detail about how the system will apply, control operations following each
event and the rules of validating data entered into the system will be
defined or specified in this stage.
5. Physical Design
This is the final stage of SSADM and provides guidelines regarding physical
implementation which should be applicable to most hardware and software
configurations. During this design the logical system specification and technical
specification are used to create a physical design and a set program specifications. The
detailed logical project is converted into a technical project with the well suited
equipments and software. . It includes data about the files, the data base, the integrated
programs, the functions and the used procedures. In the end of this stage the
development program and the test plans of the achieved system are made, then the
operation instructions and the manual procedures are specified and the detailed
specifications of the program (elearning.ukcbc.co.uk, Further Reading SSADM PDF)

P2.2 - DISCUSS ENTITY-RELATIONSHIP MODELING SUCH AS ONE-TO-ONE, ONE-TOMANY AND MANY-TO-MANY RELATIONSHIP AND NORMALIZATION WITH 1ST, 2ND
AND 3RD NORMALIZATION TO DESIGN DATABASE SOLUTION FOR COMPUTER
CHOICE.

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DATA MODELING
Data modeling is the formalization and documentation of existing processes and events that
occur during application software design and development. Data modelers often use multiple
models to view the same data and ensure that all processes, entities, relationships and data
flows have been identified.
ENTITY-RELATIONSHIP Diagram
This is a data modeling technique and a graphical representation of the entities and the
relationships between them. Entity relationship diagrams are a useful. (Margaret Rouse
(March 2007), searchcrm.techtarget.com)
The steps involved in creating an ERD are:

Identify the entities.

Determine all significant interactions.

Analyze the nature of the interactions.

raw the ERD

2. Components of E_R Diagram

a) Entity:
Entities represent objects or things of interest. In E-R diagram its represented by
rectangle.
For Example: in an organisation employee, department, product and manager are
entity.

b) Attributes
It describes the characteristic or property of an entity. An attributes is represented by
eclipse.
For Example: name, id, age and address can be attributes of the student

c) Key attribute
It represents the main characteristic of an entity. It is used to represent primary key
and eclipse with underlying line represent this.
d) Primary Key

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A candidate key that is chosen to represent a record uniquely called primary key.
That is, a table may consist of many candidate keys, but ONLY ONE can be selected
as a primary key. (sqa.org.uk)
e) Foreign Key
An attribute or a set of attributes of one table that is matched to candidate keys of
another table (or even the same table)
a) One-to-One (1:1)
Each entity in A can be related to at most one entity in B, and vies versa

The above example describes that one student can enrol any one course and
course will also have only one student.
b) One-to-Many (1: N)
Each entity in B can be related to at most one entity in A, but an entity in A
may be related to many entities in B.

For Example: student enrols only one course but course can have many
students
c) Many-to-Many (N:N)
An entity can be related to many entities in the other set, and vice versa

The above figure represents that many students can enrol for more than one
course (Studytonight 2013)
NORMALIZATION OF DATABASE

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This is a systematic way of decomposing tables to eliminate data redundancy and

undesirable characteristics like insertion, update and deletion anomalies (Studytonight 2013)
Normalizations could be divided into three forms
1. First Normal form
The following requirements should to satisfy the 1st NF:
No multivalued attributes
Every attribute value is atomic
There are no repeating groups: two columns do not store similar information
in the same table.
Table-1

The above table have multiple values and reducing duplicate or multi value
entries in the first for then the table would look like:

2. 2nd Normal Form

The requirements to satisfy the 2nd NF:
All requirements for 1st NF must be met.

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 Each table has a primary key: minimal set of attributes which can uniquely
identify a record
Every non-key attribute must be defined by the entire key, not by only part of
the key
No partial functional dependencies
Redundant data across multiple rows of a table must be moved to a separate
table.
The resulting tables must be related to each other by use of foreign key.

For Example: the product datails will look like:

3. 3rd Normal Form

The requirements to satisfy the 3rd NF:
All requirements for 2nd NF must be met.
Eliminate fields that do not depend on the primary key; that is, any field that is
dependent not only on the primary key but also on another field must be
moved to another table. This is called transitive

Normalization can decrease redundancy, increase efficiency and reduce anomalies by

implementing three levels of normalization called Normal Forms. The three NFs are usually
sufficient for most small to medium size applications. (cse.yeditepe.edu.tr)

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