Course Material

This is a first course on databases, focusing on how to use a database management system and design a database effectively. No prior exposure to database systems is assumed. This course is a prerequisite for the more advanced courses 4112 and 6111. The course will focus on relational databases, but will also touch on object-relational databases, graph databases, and NoSQL.

There is one required text, ``Database System Concepts'' by Silberschatz, Korth and Sudarshan (seventh edition, published by WCB/McGraw-Hill), which should be available at Bookculture on 112th street. Also, Amazon seems to have relatively good pricing on this book. Note that there is an electronic version of the textbook available for the Kindle App that is significantly cheaper than the physical book.

The course will cover material mainly from chapters 1-17. Some material from other chapters may also be covered (and will be announced in class.) Copies of the textbook have been placed on reserve in the Science & Engineering Library.

Additional material related to the textbook (including solutions to some of the exercises) can be found here.

There are three sections of 4111 offered in Spring 2020 with different instructors. The sections share a core set of topics based around the bulletin description, but may differ in the choice of the additional topics covered. The lectures, homeworks, projects and exams will be largely independent.