OBAFEMI AWOLOWO UNIVERSITY, ILE-IFE

DATABASE MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS CSC 305

DATABASE ARCHITECTURE,
CONCEPTS AND MODELS
OGUNJIMI, OLAWALE OLUWASEGUN
CSC/2012/056

1. Database Architecture
Database architecture focuses on the design, development, implementation and maintenance of
computer programs that store and organize information for businesses, agencies and institutions.
The architecture of a database system determines its capability, reliability, effectiveness and
efficiency in meeting user requirements. But besides the visible functions seen through some
data manipulation language, a good database architecture should provide:
a) Independence of data and programs
b) Ease of system design
c) Ease of programming
d) Powerful query facilities
e) Protection of data
The features listed above become especially important in large organisations where corporate
data are held centrally. In such situations, no single user department has responsibility over, nor
can they be expected to know about, all of the organisations data. This becomes the job of a
Database Administrator (DBA) who has a daunting range of responsibilities that include
creating, expanding, protecting and maintaining the integrity of all data while addressing the
interests of different present and future user communities. To create a database, a DBA has to
analyse and assess the data requirements of all users and from these determine its logical
structure (database schema).
Data Abstraction
To meet the requirements above, a more sophisticated architecture is in fact used, providing a
number of levels of data abstraction or data definition. The database schema, also known as
Conceptual Schema, mentioned above represents an information model at the logical level of
data definition. At this level, we abstract out details like computer storage structures, their
restrictions, or their operational efficiencies.
The Internal Schema maps the contents of the conceptual schema onto structures representing
tuples, associated key organisations and indexes, etc., taking into account application
characteristics and restrictions of a given computer system.
An External Schema presents only those aspects of the conceptual schema that are relevant to the
particular application at hand, abstracting out all other details.
Data Administration
Functions of a DBA include:
1. Creation of the database
To create a database, a DBA has to analyse and assess the requirements of the users and
from these determine its logical structure. In other words, the DBA has to design a
conceptual schema and a first variant of an internal schema. When the internal schema is
ready, the DBA must load the database with actual data.

2. Acting as intermediary between users and the database

A DBA is responsible for all user facilities determined by external schemas, ie. the DBA
is responsible for defining all external schemas or user views.
3. Ensuring data privacy, integrity and security
In analysing user requirements, a DBA must determine who should have access to which
data and subsequently arrange for appropriate privacy locks (passwords) for identified
individuals and/or groups. The DBA must also determine integrity constraints and
arrange for appropriate data validation to ensure that such constraints are never violated.
Last, but not least, the DBA must make arrangements for data to be regularly backed up
and stored in a safe place as a measure against unrecoverable data losses for one reason
or another.
Data Independence
Data independence refers to the independence of one user view (external schema) with respect to
others. A high degree of independence is desirable as it will allow a DBA to change one view, to
meet new requirements and/or to optimise performance, without affecting other views. Relational
databases with appropriate relational sub-languages have a high degree of data independence.
Data Protection
There are generally three types of data protection that any serious DBMS must provide:
1. Authorisational Security
This refers to protection against unauthorised access and includes measures such as user
identification and password control, privacy keys, etc.
2. Operational Security
This refers to maintaining the integrity of data, ie. protecting the database from the
introduction of data that would violate identified integrity constraints.
3. Physical Security
This refers to procedures to protect the physical data against accidental loss or damage of
storage equipment, theft, natural disaster, etc. It will typically involve making periodic
backup copies of the database, transaction journalling, error recovery techniques, etc.

2. Database System Concepts

Overview
The data in the Data Warehouse is stored using a relational database management system (or
RDBMS) . Relational databases store their data in two-dimensional tables (rather like
spreadsheets).
Tables
Each record within a table is stored in a row, and each data element (or field) within a row is
stored in a column. (The two dimensions of a table are row and column.)

Primary Keys
A primary key (PK), consisting of one or more columns, uniquely identifies each row in a table.

Joining Tables
Tables may be joined to each other.
Indexed Columns
An index works just like the index in the back of a book. For example, you can do a sequential
read and look at every page of a book to find the references to John Doe, or you and find those
references faster by doing an indexed read, using the index (which happens to point to just 3
pages out of a 500 page book).
Null Values
Unless otherwise specified, a column in a table may have a null value. Any column that is part of
the primary key, or that has been specified as being Not Null, may not contain a null value. All
other columns may contain null values.
SQL. Structured Query Language (SQL) is the ANSI (American National Standards Institute)
standard language for use with relational database management systems. Query tools (such as
Business Objects) automatically translate your query specifications into SQL.
The SQL for a query generally has four parts:

The SELECT clause, a required clause that specifies the column(s) to be retrieved

The FROM clause, a required clause that specifies the table(s) from which the data is to
be retrieved

The WHERE clause, an optional clause that specifies the conditions for selecting specific
rows to be retrieved

The ORDER BY clause, an optional clause that specifies the sort order in which the
retrieved rows are to be written to the query output

3. Data models and types of data models

Data Model can be defined as an integrated collection of concepts for describing and
manipulating data, relationships between data, and constraints on the data in an organization.
A data model comprises of three components:
A structural part, consisting of a set of rules according to which databases can be constructed.
A manipulative part. Defining the types of operation that are allowed on the data (this includes
the operations that are used or updating or retrieving data from the database and for changing the
structure of the database).
Possibly a set of integrity rules, which ensures that the data is accurate.
There are different types of data models and these include:

Flat model

This may not strictly qualify as a data model. The flat (or table) model consists of a
single, two-dimensional array of data elements, where all members of a given column are
assumed to be similar values, and all members of a row are assumed to be related to one
another.

Hierarchical model
In this model data is organized into a tree-like structure, implying a single upward link in
each record to describe the nesting, and a sort field to keep the records in a particular
order in each same-level list.
Network model
This model organizes data using two fundamental constructs, called records and sets.
Records contain fields, and sets define one-to-many relationships between records: one
owner, many members.
Relational model
is a database model based on first-order predicate logic. Its core idea is to describe a
database as a collection of predicates over a finite set of predicate variables, describing
constraints on the possible values and combinations of values.
Object-relational model
Similar to a relational database model, but objects, classes and inheritance are directly
supported in database schemas and in the query language.
Star schema
The simplest style of data warehouse schema. The star schema consists of a few "fact
tables" (possibly only one, justifying the name) referencing any number of "dimension
tables".

4. Data Models for Nigeria

In Nigeria, so many data models have been proposed and some of those data models are listed
below:
One of the data models for Nigeria is the Spatial Conceptual Data Model for Public Health in
Nigeria published by P.A. Idowu et al. of Obafemi Awolowo University. This model addresses
all the health problems and their causes and it could be used to develop any system such as
national public health database system, and disease surveillance system.
Another data model for Nigeria is the Model for Forecasting the Demand and Supply of
Electricity in Nigeria developed by Benjamin Oyediran and Ademola Adedoyin. The model is
used to determine the market volatility in the demand and supply chains of electricity in Nigeria.
The Empirical models for the Correlation of Global Solar Radiation with Meteorological data for
Iseyin, Nigeria by Falayi et al. is another data model for Nigeria. The model uses a number of
multilinear regression equations to predict the relationship between global solar radiations with
combinations of different weather parameters for Iseyin, Nigeria.

5. Enhanced Entity Relationship Model

The enhanced entityrelationship (EER) model (or extended entityrelationship model) is a highlevel or conceptual data model incorporating extensions to the original entityrelationship (ER)
model, used in the design of databases.
It was developed to reflect more precisely the properties and constraints that are found in more
complex databases, such as in engineering design and manufacturing
(CAD/CAM), telecommunications, complex software systems and geographic information
systems (GIS).
The EER model includes all of the concepts introduced by the ER model. Additionally it includes
the concepts of a subclass and superclass (Is-a), along with the concepts of
specialization and generalization. Furthermore, it introduces the concept of a union type or
category, which is used to represent a collection of objects that is the union of objects of
different entity types.
Subclass and Superclass
Entity type Y is a subtype (subclass) of an entity type X if and only if every Y is necessarily an
X. A subclass entity inherits all attributes and relationships of its superclass entity. This property
is called the attribute and relationship inheritance. A subclass entity may have its own specific
attributes and relationships (together with all the attributes and relationships it inherits from the
superclass).

Formal Definitions for the EER Model Concepts

Class
Set or collection of entities
Includes any of the EER schema constructs of group entities
Subclass
Class whose entities must always be a subset of the entities in another class
Predicate-defined
Predicate on the attributes of is used to specify which entities in Care members of S
User-defined
Subclass that is not defined by a predicate
Category
Class that is a subset of the union of n defining superclasses
Relationship type
Any class can participate in a relationship

An example of Enhanced Entity-relationship model is a University EER Database

The database includes:
Students and their majors
Transcripts, and registration
Universitys course offerings

REFERENCES
Idowu P.A. et al. A Spatial Conceptual Data Model For Public Health in Nigeria. International
Journal of Research in Business and Technology Vol 4. No. 3 (2014).
Oyelami B.O. and Adewumi A.A. Models For Forecasting the Demand and Supply of Electricity
in Nigeria. Science and Education Publishing

Falayi E.O. et al. Empirical Models for the Correlation of Global Solar Radiation with
Meteorological Data for Iseyin, Nigeria