CS542 -- Database Management Systems Course (Fall 2007)

Class Meetings

Venue: WPI in Fuller Labs 311
Date/Time: Thursdays at 6:00pm - 8:50 pm

Teaching Staff

Instructor: Elke A. Rundensteiner , Office in Fuller Labs 238, x5815,
Office Hours: Tu: 12:00am - 1:00pm (noon), Th: 9:00pm - 10:00pm (after class). If there are any changes to office hours, those would be announced here.

Course Description

This course is an introduction to the theory and design of database management systems (DBMSs). Topics covered include internals of database management systems, fundamental concepts in database theory, and database application design and development. In particular, logical design and conceptual modeling, physical database design strategies, relational data model and query languages (SQL), query optimization, concurrency control and transaction management.

While we primarily concentrate on relational DBMSs, we may possibly also touch on selected topics from the current database research literature, such as distributed databases, web databases, object-relational databases, decision support systems, data warehousing, data mining, based on available time and interests of the students.

Quantitative examples and hands-on assignments will be given. Students will conduct a course project.