INLS 523 - Fall 2009
Instructor: Alice Etim, Doctoral Candidate
UNC School of Information and Library Science
Course Details
- Class meets: Mondays and Wednesdays, 3:30pm-4:45pm in Manning Hall, Room 117
- Credits: 3 hours
- Prerequisite: Information Tools (INLS 261 or INLS 461)
- Teaching and Interaction Strategies: Lectures and course activities for students - assignments, readings, semester-long database project, labs, discussion groups, and class participation.
- Instructor's e-mail: etim@email.unc.edu
Course Description and Objectives
Databases and database technology drive the uses and management of volumes of data that are generated in all sectors of human endeavors. For example, universities have large database holdings of academic resources and records for their students. The Library of Congress database, Thomas, holds data for U.S. congressional records, legislations, and many historical documents. Large companies and medical institutions have databases that help to support the production of goods or the delivery of services to employees and customers.
This course will provide instruction in fundamental principles and user-centric methodologies for an effective database design. The course will be driven by design activities conducted for a semester-long project. It will begin with a description of data flow through organizations based on tasks and operations. Then, data modeling using entity relationship (ER) model. Subsequent sections will include requirement specification and analysis of design problems. Students will generate their project descriptions based on understanding and interest in specific design problems. At this time, the focus will shift to design tasks involving forms, queries and report generation. Specific objectives include the following:
- To understand the database management system (DBMS) architecture and components
- To learn database (DB) design principles and requirements
- To learn data modeling and schema transformation
- To gain understanding and experience in database design tools
- To apply the above cumulative knowledge to create a database prototype and evaluate it.