Relational Model

Concepts
 The relational model represents the database as a
collection of relations.

 Informally, each relation resembles a table of values

or, to some extent, a flat file of records.
 It is called a flat file because each record has a simple
linear or flat structure.
 When a relation is thought of as a table of values,
◦ each row in the table represents a collection of related data
values.
 A row represents a fact that typically
corresponds to a real-world entity or
relationship.
 The table name and column names are used to
help to interpret the meaning of the values in
each row.

 The column names—Name, Student_number,

Class, and Major—specify how to interpret the
data values in each row, based on the column
each value is in.
 All values in a column are of the same data type.
 In the formal relational model terminology,
◦ a row is called a tuple,
◦ a column header is called an attribute, and
◦ the table is called a relation.

 The data type describing the types of values that can

appear in each column is represented by a domain of
possible values.
 Domains, Attributes,
Tuples, and Relations
Domains, Attributes, Tuples, and Relations
 A domain D is a set of atomic values.
◦ Atomic - each value in the domain is indivisible .

 A common method of specifying a domain is

◦ to specify a data type from which the data values forming the
domain are drawn.
 It is also useful to specify a name for the domain, to help in
interpreting its values.
 A domain is thus given a
◦ name, data type, and format
 Usa_phone_numbers.
◦ The set of ten-digit phone numbers valid in the
United States.
 Local_phone_numbers.
◦ The set of seven-digit phone numbers valid
within a particular area code in the United States.
 Social_security_numbers.
◦ The set of valid nine-digit Social Security
numbers.
◦ (This is a unique identifier assigned to each
person in the United States for employment, tax,
and benefits purposes.)
 Names:
◦ The set of character strings that represent names
of persons.
 Grade_point_averages.
◦ Possible values of computed grade point
averages; each must be a real (floating-point)
number between 0 and 4.
 Employee_ages.
◦ Possible ages of employees in a company; each
must be an integer value between 15 and 80.
 Academic_department_names.
◦ The set of academic department names in a
university, such as Computer Science, Economics,
and Physics.
 Academic_department_codes.
◦ The set of academic department codes, such as
‘CS’, ‘ECON’, and ‘PHYS’.
 A relation schema R, denoted by
R(A1,A2,...,An), is made up of
◦ a relation name R and
◦ a list of attributes, A1,A2, ...,An.
 Each attribute Ai is the name of a role played by
some domain D in the relation schema R.
 D is called the domain of Ai and is denoted by
dom(Ai).
 A relation schema is used to describe a relation; R
is called the name of this relation.
 The degree(or arity) of a relation is the number of
attributes n of its relation schema.
 A relation of degree seven, which stores
information about university students, would
contain seven attributes describing each
student as follows:
◦ STUDENT(Name, Ssn, Home_phone, Address,
Office_phone, Age, Gpa)
 Using the data type of each attribute, the
definition is sometimes written as:
◦ STUDENT(Name: string, Ssn : string, Home_phone :
string, Address : string, Office_phone : string, Age :
integer, Gpa : real)
 For this relation schema,
 STUDENT is the name of the relation, which

has seven attributes.

 STUDENT relation : dom(Name) = Names,

dom(Ssn) = Social_security_numbers ,
dom(HomePhone) = USA_phone_numbers ,
dom(Office_phone) = USA_phone_numbers,
and dom(Gpa) = Grade_point_averages.
 A relation (or relation state) r of the relation
schema R(A1, A2, ..., An), denoted by r(R),
◦ is a set of n-tuples r= {t1,t2, ...,tm}.

 Each n-tuple t is an ordered list of n values

t=<v1,v2, ..., vn>, where each value vi, 1≤i ≤n, is an
element of dom(Ai) or is a special NULL value.
 The ith value in tuple t, which corresponds to the
attribute Ai, is referred to as t[Ai] or t.Ai
 Relation Schema R is known as relation
intension
 Relation state r(R) is known as relation

extension.
 Eg: STUDENT relation, which corresponds to
the STUDENT schema.
 Each tuple in the relation represents a

particular student entity (or object).

 The relation is displayed as a table , where

each tuple is shown as a row and each

attribute corresponds to a column header
indicating a role or interpretation of the
values in that column.
 NULL values represent attributes whose
values are unknown or do not exist for some
individual STUDENT tuple.
The attributes and tuples of a
relation STUDENT.
Relational Model
Notation
Relational Model Notation
 A relation schema R of degree n is denoted
by R(A1,A2, ...,An).
◦ The uppercase letters Q,R,S denote relation names.
◦ The lowercase letters q,r,s denote relation states.
◦ The letters t,u,v denote tuples.
 In general,
◦ the name of a relation schema such as STUDENT
also indicates the current set of tuples in that
relation—the current relation state—whereas
STUDENT(Name, Ssn, ...) refers only to the relation
schema.
 An attribute A can be qualified with the
relation name R to which it belongs by using
the dot notation R.A—for example,
STUDENT.Name or STUDENT.Age.
 This is because the same name may be used

for two attributes in different relations.

However, all attribute names in a particular
relation must be distinct.
 An n-tuple t in a relation r(R) is denoted by
t= <v1,v2, ...,vn>, where vi is the value
corresponding to attribute Ai.
 The following notation refers to component
values of tuples:
◦ Both t[Ai] and t.Ai (and sometimes t[i]) refer to the
value vi in t for attribute Ai.
◦ Both t[Au, Aw, ..., Az] and t.(Au, Aw, ..., Az), where Au,
Aw, ..., Az is a list of attributes from R, refer to the
subtuple of values <vu,vw, ...,vz> from t
corresponding to the attributes specified in the list.
 the tuple t= <‘Barbara Benson’, ‘533-69-
1238’, ‘(817)839-8461’, ‘7384 Fontana
Lane’,NULL, 19, 3.25>
 t[Name] = <‘Barbara Benson’>,

t[Ssn,Gpa,Age] = <‘533-69-1238’,3.25, 19>.