CPSC 310: Database Systems /
CPSC 603: Database Systems and Applications
Fall 2007

Announcements

• 12/7: Philip will hold a review session for the final on Monday, Dec 10, 6:00 - 8:00 PM, in room 219 Bright.

• 12/3: Final exam review is now available. And here is an old final exam.

• 12/3: For logging into the department database server in your Java program:

  String connectionString =
  "jdbc:mysql://database2.cs.tamu.edu:3306/YOURDATABASENAME?user=YOURUSERNAME&password=YOURPASSWORD";
  
  Connection conn= DriverManager.getConnection(connectionString);
  

  Online documentation on JDBC is at: http://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.0/en/connector-j.html

• 11/30: Demos are being scheduled now for Wed, Dec 5 and Thu, Dec 6. You will have a 9 minute time slot (with 1 minute in between slots). Time slots start at 10:30 AM, 10:40 AM, 10:50 AM,..., 12:00 noon, 1:00 PM, 1:10 PM, ..., 3:50 PM on the two days. Demos will be held in the lab in room 219 Bright. I will bring the sign-up sheet to class on Tuesday. You can also email me (welch@cs.tamu.edu) before then to choose a time. If you CANNOT make any of these times, please email Qingwu directly to schedule an alternative time for your demo.

• 11/27: Homework 7, due Tue, 12/4, is now available.

• 11/20: Deadline for part 5 of the project is extended to Tue, Dec 4, if you care to have it. Note that the last homework assignment will also be due that day, though.

• 11/19: Here is the figure that was missing from question 4, part (c) of the old exam.

• 11/14: Here is an old exam.

• 11/14: Philip will hold a review for Exam 2 on Thu, Nov 15, 5:30 - 7:30 PM (or until all questions are answered), in room 219 HRBB.

• 11/13: Dr. Welch's office hours on Wed, Nov 14, are changed to 2:00 - 3:30 PM.

• 11/13: Exam 2 review is now available.

• 11/8: Homework 6, due Thu, 11/15, is now available.

• 10/30: For Ex. 11.3.1 (b), check the errata web site for the book (http://infolab.stanford.edu/%7Eullman/dscb/errata3.html): you need to know that the tracks are located on the outer inch of a 3.5-inch-diameter surface.

• 10/30: Project part 4 due date is postponed to Thu, Nov 8. Culture report 4 due date is postponed to Tue, Nov 13. Common errors on part 3 of the project: failing to define a key; not making sure that key attributes in your synthetic data are really keys (no duplicates); not ensuring that there is enough common data in your synthetic relations to have nontrivial joins. You must fix these problems for part 4.

• 10/25: Dr. Welch's office hours on Mon, Oct 29, are moved to Tue, Oct 30, 2:00 - 3:30 PM.

• 10/24: Homework 5, due Thu, 11/1, is now available.

• 10/24: Exam 2 is definitely scheduled for Tue, 11/20.

• 10/19: Just to clarify, on part 3 of the project, you are two create and work with TWO databases, one small one with handcrafted data, and one large one with synthetic data created by a program.

• 10/16: Regarding the project: please be careful with your names. Common errors / bad form are using illegal characters (like /) in a name, using the same name for different relations, having two different names that only differ in the case (upper or lower) of characters, using names that are not descriptive.

• 10/15: On HW 4: For the question asking you to write two different queries using subqueries, it is sufficient to just write one. (Of course, you are welcome to write two as an additional learning experience!)

• 10/12: You might find this web site handy for explaining the differences between MySQL and standard SQL

• 10/12: Philip's office hours are still the same (Tue, Thu 5:30 - 6:30, and Wed 12:40 - 3:00), but the location is changed to HRBB 214.

• 10/11: Office hour changes for next week:
  • Qingwu's office hours on Mon, Oct 15 will be 2:00 - 3:30 PM.
  • Dr. Welch's office hours on Wed, Oct 17 are moved to Fri, Oct 19, 10:00 - 11:30 AM.

• 10/9: I'm postponing the due dates for the project parts 3, 4 and 5. Please see calendar and/or project page for details.

• 10/9: Homework 4, due Tue, 10/16, is now available.

• 10/7: The peer teacher, Philip Ritchey, will hold a review session for Exam 1 this Monday night, Oct 8, 8:00 - 10:00 PM (or until the questions stop, he says), in 214 Bright. Please attend with your questions.

• 10/2: Exam 1 review is now available.

• 10/1: Qingwu's office hours on Wed, Oct 3, are moved to Thu, Oct 4, 10:30 AM - 12:00 noon.

• 9/27: Philip Ritchey, the peer teacher for the course, will have scheduled office hours on Tuesdays and Thursdays 5:30 - 6:30 PM in room 214 Bright. Philip is a great resource for you - please take advantage of his expertise!!

• 9/27: In response to a request from a student, I am making an old exam available here.

• 9/26: Instead of using database.cs.tamu.edu, which is the old MySQL server, please use database2.cs.tamu.edu, which has a newer version. You can claim your database2.cs.tamu.edu account by going to your My Account page on CSNet and then clicking the Database Account link on the lefthand side.

• 9/26: Turn in your graded project part 1 with your part 2! That way, we can see if you made any changes to your E/R diagram and how your relations compare to your final E/R diagram. Thanks.

• 9/24: Change to turn-in procedure for homework: Please turn in paper copy of your TYPED assignment plus cover sheet during class. Do *not* use the turn-in program. I apologize for the confusion. Also, HW 3 is now available on web, due Thu, Oct 4.

• 9/20: Date for Exam 1 is finalized as Tue, Oct 9.

• 9/20: Clarification on the HW: when you use the turn-in program to submit your homework, you should be turning in either plain text or PDF files. The assignment should be typed (i.e., don't scan handwritten pages into PDF).

• 9/19: Another correction to HW 2: On the first problem for Section 3.7, the relation R should have five attributes, A through E.

• 9/19: Correction to HW 2: Reference to (nonexistent) Exercise 3.6.7 has been changed to be 3.6.1.

• 9/14: Homework 2, due Thu, 9/20, is now finalized (a few more exercises were added).

• 9/13: Slides on multivalued dependencies updated. Slides of classroom example problem on normalization available here.

• 9/7: Homework 2 is now available, due Thu, 9/20.

• 9/6: When submitting assignments, you will need to draw any diagrams in some drawing program, e.g., powerpoint, xfig, or Dia. Philip (peer teacher) recommends Dia: "Here is the link to the Dia for Windows site: http://dia-installer.de/index_en.html. Dia is an open source alternative to Microsoft Visio.? It is very useful for drawing many types of diagrams, such as E/R, UML, and flowcharts.? Also, exporting a diagram as a JPEG (or any one of many other file types) is very simple.? I used it extensively when I took CPSC 310 and have used it multiple times in other classes as well."

• 9/5: Course project information is now available.

• 9/3: Syllabus below is updated with contact information for the teaching assistant and the peer teacher.

• 9/3: Dr. Welch's office hours for the semester will be Mondays, 10:00 - 11:30, and Wednesdays, 3:00 - 4:30.

• Assignments for first week of class: Read Chapters 1 and 2, and start Homework 1.

• Powerpoint slides from lectures are available in the Calendar section.

Back to beginning

Syllabus

Teaching Assistant: Qingwu Yang
Office: 328A H.R. Bright Bldg
Office Hours: Mondays and Wednesdays 10:30 AM - 12:00 noon; other times by appointment
Email: qingwu-yang (at) tamu.edu
Office Phone: 845-5457

Peer Teacher (undergraduate assistant): Philip Ritchey
Office Hours: Tuesdays and Thursdays 5:30 - 6:30 PM, Wednesdays 12:40 - 3:30 PM; other times by appointment.
His office hours are held in 214 H.R. Bright Bldg
Email: philip.ritchey (at) gmail.com

Course URL: http://parasol.cs.tamu.edu/people/welch/teaching/310.f07

Prerequisites: For CPSC 310, prerequisite is CPSC 211 (or 210); For CPSC 603, prerequisite is CPSC 601. In particular, you should be familiar with hash tables and search trees.

Lecture: Tuesdays and Thursdays, 12:45 - 2:00 PM, HRBB 124.

Textbook: Database Systems, The Complete Book, Hector Garcia-Molina, Jeffrey D. Ullman, and Jennifer Widom, Prentice Hall, 2002.

Your grade will be based on four components:

• exams 45% - There will be two midterm exams and one final exam, worth 15% each.

• homework 15% - More details are available here.

• project 35% - There will be a significant programming project. More details are available here.

• culture reports 5% - This component is to round out your classwork. Find, read, and write short reports on five technical papers in computer science journals. More details are available here.

No late assignments will be accepted. There will be no make-up exams except for university-excused absences. Please discuss unusual circumstances in advance with the instructor.

Course grades will be assigned according to this scale:
A for 90% or above of the total points, B for 80 to 89%,
C for 70 to 79%,
D for 60 to 69%,
and F for less than 60%.

Academic Integrity: The Aggie Honor Code states "An Aggie does not lie, cheat or steal or tolerate those who do". More information on academic integrity, plagiarism, etc. is available at the Aggie Honor System Office web site http://www.tamu.edu/aggiehonor, including:

• Definitions of academic misconduct, which includes plagiarism
• List of sanctions that can be applied if academic misconduct is found.

For the assignments in this class, discussion of concepts with others is encouraged, but all assignments must be done on your own, unless otherwise instructed. If you use any source other than the text, reference it/him/her, whether it be a person, a book, a solution set, a web page or whatever. You MUST write up the solutions in your own words. Copying is strictly forbidden. Every assignment must be turned in with this cover sheet, which lists all sources you used.

Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) Policy Statement: The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) is a federal antidiscrimination statute that provides comprehensive civil rights protection for persons with disabilities. Among other things, this legislation requires that all students with disabilities be guaranteed a learning environment that provides for reasonable accommodation of their disabilities. If you believe you have a disability requiring an accommodation, please contact the Department of Student Life, Services for Students with Disabilities in Cain Hall, Rm. B118, or call 845-1637.

Back to beginning

Calendar

• readings
• homework
• project
• exams
• culture reports

• details on the assignments
• exam reviews

Powerpoint slides for lectures are available here:

• Introduction: 8/28
• Entity-Relationship Model: 8/30
• Relational Model and Converting from E/R: 9/4
• Functional Dependencies: 9/6
• Normalization: 9/11
• Multivalued Dependencies: 9/13
• Relational Algebra: 9/18
• Introduction to SQL: 9/20
• More on SQL: 9/25
• Constraints, Triggers and Views: 10/2
• Combining SQL and Conventional Programming Languages: 10/11
• Transactions: 10/11
• Data Storage: 10/16
• Representing Data Elements: 10/18
• Indexes on Sequential Files: 10/23
• Secondary Indexes and B-Trees: 10/23, 10/25
• Hashing: 10/30
• Query Execution: One-Pass Algorithms: 10/30
• Query Execution: Two-Pass Algorithms: 11/1
• Query Compilation: Logical Query Plans: 11/8
• Query Compilation: Physical Query Plans: 11/13
• Recovery: Undo and Redo Logging: 11/27 (only through slide 34)
• Recovery: Undo/Redo Logging: skip
• Concurrency Control: 11/27, 11/29 (only through slide 42)
• More on Transaction Management: 11/29 (only through slide 24)

Back to beginning

Homework

Back to beginning

Project

Back to beginning

Culture Reports

You are to find, read, and write short reports on five technical papers in computer science journals. Articles in the following two journals are usually at about the right level:

• Communications of the ACM
• IEEE Computer

Each report is to be one to two pages long, typed, and must include

• correct bibliographic information for the paper (title of article; names of all authors; name of journal with volume, number, date and page numbers)
• a summary of the paper contents
• at least one comment about the paper or question that it raised in your mind, indicating that you have thought critically about the material.
• Filled-in cover sheet.
• a copy of the original article attached.

DO NOT PLAGIARIZE! You must write up your summary in your own words. See academic integrity policy in the syllabus.

Report due dates are indicated in the calendar and are summarized here:

• Culture Report 1: due Tue, Sep 11
• Culture Report 2: due Thu, Sep 27
• Culture Report 3: due Thu, Oct 18
• Culture Report 4: due Tue, Nov 13 (*new due date*)
• Culture Report 5: due Thu, Nov 29

Tips for getting full points on your culture reports:

• TURN IT IN ON TIME.
• Choose an appropriate level article. It should have a reasonable level of technical depth (relating to computing) and be of reasonable length. An editorial full of jokes is too easy; a 30 page paper from a highly technical journal full of proofs is probably too hard. You should be able to learn something from the article.
• Don't be too skimpy on your summary.
• Clearly mark your own comments and critical evaluation. Say something at least mildly insightful. "I learned a lot/it made me think" is not enough. What did you like and why? Is there a flaw in the paper? How does it relate to something else you may be aware of? Etc.
• Include the bibliographic citation in your summary.
• Include a copy of the paper itself.
• Use a spell-checker and grammar checker.

Back to beginning

Useful Links

• Web site for the textbook

• William Kent's guide to normal forms

• Computer Science Peer Teacher web site

• Turn-in program information

• MySQL web page and tutorial

• Using MySQL at TAMU

• SQL Tutorial from W3 Schools

• Differences between MySQL and standard SQL

Computing-Related at TAMU

• Texas A&M Computing Society (TACS) -- student organization for those interested in computing. Affiliated with the two main professional organizations, ACM and IEEE Computer Society.

• Computer Science Department, TAMU

• Student Computing and Information Page: central source of information about student computing at TAMU.

• Information for students from CIS

Careers and Mentoring

• Office of Honors Programs and Academic Scholarships

• TAMU Co-operative Education (Career Center)

• CS Dept. Student Research Information

• Computing Research Association Distributed Mentor Project for Undergraduate Females in Computer Science and Engineering

Back to beginning