UFIEKG-20-2: Data, Schemas and Applications

Background. The need to store, transform, locate and present data of many forms (numeric, textual, relational, graphical, visual and auditory). Unstructured text through semi-structured networks to homogeneous relational structures. Data, information and knowledge. Application areas such as personal, corporate, public and collaborative data bases.

Data structures and operations. Elemental and composite data structures of data: atoms, propositions, sets, sequences, relations, networks, objects. Relationships: links, pointers, shared values, adjacency, nesting, spatial. Operations: restricting, projecting, combining, navigating, transforming.

Data Schemas. Separation/Composition of data, schema (including constraints) and meta data. Languages for describing schemas - UML models and SQL DDL for tables, Data structure diagrams, BNF and XSchema for hierarchical structures. Composition, types and sub-types and inheritance. Data schemas for typical problems.

Technologies. Relational database management systems (DBMS) such as MySQL, using SQL for definition and manipulation of data. Object Relational DBMS such as Oracle 9i, XML native databases. Client-server and N-tier architectures. Concurrency, recovery, access control.

Implementation. Mapping information objects - documents, indexes, guides, maps, sound and videos and their relationships to data structures in the appropriate technology. Mapping ER models to relational database, hierarchies to XML. Implementing indexing and search capabilities.

Presentation schemas: XML and CSS for text and tables, GIF, JPG and SVG for charts, graphs and diagrams, multi-media formats for video and sound. Transforming Data to information: Virtual and materialised views, dynamic server-side processing with a procedural language e.g. PHP, declarative language e.g. XSLT

Design process: Re-engineering existing data sets, normalisation, functional dependencies, ORM and Entity models. multiple perspectives, views and view integration, information architecture for Web sites.

Problem-centred learning will be used to develop a professional, integrated approach to information storage and presentation tasks. There will be two tasks set. In the first semester, students work in groups of 2-3 to re-engineer an existing mess such as employee and organisation currently distributed over multiple, inconsistent sources, to a relational database and provide search and presentation facilities. In the second semester, students work alone on a task requiring the identification and design of an XML schema and its implementation.

This problem-centred approach will be supported by appropriate on-line teaching material, selected master-classes on topics as they arise in the course of the project. To develop the higher cognitive skills, students will be required to defend the choices made in their designs in a class-based critical review in each semester.

Bean, J (2003). XML for Data Architects, Morgan Kaufman [ISBN: 1558609075 ]

Castro, E (2001). XML for the World Wide Web, Peachpit Press [ISBN: 0201710986 ]

Colomb, R.M (2002). Information Spaces - the Architecture of Cyberspace, Springer [ISBN: 1852335505 ]

Elmasri,R. and Navathe,S.B (2003). Fundamentals of Database Systems 4th ed, Addison Wesley [ISBN: 032141506X ]

Fowler, M., (1997). Analysis Patterns - Reusable Object Models, Addison Wesley [ISBN: 0201895420 ]

Fowler,M, Scott.K (1997). UML Distilled, Addison Wesley [ISBN: 0321193687 ]

Harold,R.E. and Means, W.S (2002). XML in a Nutshell, O'Reilly. [ISBN: 0596007647 ]

Rosenfeld,L. and Morville.P (2002). Information architecture, O'Reilly [ISBN: 0596000359 ]

Wurman, R.S and Jacobson, R (1999). Information Design, MIT Press [ISBN: 0262600358 ]