CS541: Database Systems Fall 2008

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Course Policy

For this course, we will be following Eugene Spafford's comprehensive course policy. Please be sure to read it over.

Academic Dishonesty

In case you didn't actually click & read the link above, academic dishonesty is covered in the section professional honesty & conduct. In the worst case, you can be expelled from the university. Don't do it!

Course Overview

This course covers fundamental concepts of database and information systems. These concepts include database modeling and design, relational databases, querying and SQL, object-based databases, XML and web databases, data storage, transactions, database system architectures, data mining and warehousing techniques, client/server paradigm, middleware, ODBC, JDBC, CORBA, privacy, integrity, and security. 

More specifically, the course covers the following topics:

• Data modeling: physical, logical and conceptual data models, the entity-relationship model
• The relational model
• SQL query language
• Other relational query languages (QBE and Datalog)
• Database privacy, integrity, and security
• Relational database design, functional dependencies, and normalization
• Object-oriented database systems
• Object-relational database systems: extensibility features and object orientation in relational systems
• XML/web databases: semi-structured data, querying, ODBC, JDBC
• Data mining, data warehousing, online analytical processing, and information retrieval
• Database system architectures: two-tier (client-server), three-tier, parallel and distributed database architectures
• Performance issues
• Indexing and Hashing
• Concurrency Control
• Multi-media Applications
• E-commerce
• Distributed Databases
• System Recovery
• Security
• Query Optimization
• Data Mining
• Information Retrieval

Textbooks

1. Database System Concepts, 5th Edition, Silberschatz, Korth, and Sudarshan, 2005.

2. Oracle 9i Programming: A Primer, Rajshekhar Sunderraman, 2004.

Grading

The final grade will be based upon the following:

Preliminary Projects	10%
Main Project	20%
Midterm	25%
Final	25%
Class Contribution	5%
Homework Assignments	15%

Problems on grading of assignments/exams/projects must be resolved within one week after the graded work is returned/project score is posted. The grades will not be modified after the one week time period.

Late Submission Policy

Late work is subject to a 10% penalty for at most one day late.