Kennesaw State University Database Courseware Project ( Mario A.M. Guimaraes and Martha Myers )

Database courseware (NSF) design and develop animations in support of key database concepts. Current topics SQL (finished prototypes) Database Design (few prototypes) Concurrency (design, 1 st prototype)

SQL Queries – prototypes available Visual Basic (downloadable) Visualization Java (java applets) Construction & Visualization

SQL Queries - motivation Low student scores in tests involving queries Construction: allows student to break SQL queries into parts and quickly access the results. Visualization: Associating code that students already know with code they are unfamiliar.

Database Design – prototype available (Flash) Convert E-R Diagrams to tables 1) Scenario 2) E-R Diagram is drawn 3) User is presented with several options 4) For each selected option, feedback, animating data redundancy and null value is shown.

E-R Diagram -> Table – motivation Instructor may show several conversion options in a few minutes. Students memorize or are given the solution (test results) Students have trouble detecting redundancy

Concurrency Lost Update (being implemented) Deadlock (being implemented)

The Lost Update: A Concurrency Problem (table view)

Deadlock

Next Prototypes Database Design: Class Diagrams Object x Relational Normalization SQL Queries Indexes: B-Trees, Hashing, Bitmap