Adapted for SEN2104 – DBMS

Week 5: Relational Algebra (Part III)

Database System Concepts

©Silberschatz, Korth and Sudarshan
 Modification of the Database
▪ The content of the database may be modified using the following
operations:
▪ Deletion
▪ Insertion
▪ Updating
▪ All these operations are expressed using the assignment
operator.

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 Deletion
▪ A delete request is expressed similarly to a query, except instead
of displaying tuples to the user, the selected tuples are removed
from the database.
▪ Can delete only whole tuples; cannot delete values on only
particular attributes
▪ A deletion is expressed in relational algebra by:
rr–E
where r is a relation and E is a relational algebra query.

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Quick Review: Set Difference Operation
▪ Notation r – s
▪ Defined as:
r – s = {t | t  r and t  s}

▪ For r – s to be valid:
1. r, s must have the same arity
2. The attribute domains must be compatible

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Quick Review: Set Difference Operation
▪ Relations r, s:
A B A B

 1  2
 2 s

 1
r

▪ r – s:
A B

 1
 1

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Banking Enterprise Schema Diagram

branch (branch-name, branch-city, assets)

customer (customer-name, customer-street, customer-city)
account (account-number, branch-name, balance)
loan (loan-number, branch-name, amount)
depositor (customer-name, account-number)
borrower (customer-name, loan-number)

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 Deletion Examples
▪ Delete all account records in the Perryridge branch.
account  account –  branch_name = “Perryridge” (account )

▪ Delete all loan records with amount in the range of 0 to 50

loan  loan –  amount  0 and amount  50 (loan)

▪ Delete all accounts at branches located in Needham.

r1   branch_city = “Needham” (account branch )

r2   account_number, branch_name, balance (r1)
r3   customer_name, account_number (r2 depositor)
account  account – r2
depositor  depositor – r3

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 Insertion

▪ To insert data into a relation, we either:

▪ specify a tuple to be inserted
▪ write a query whose result is a set of tuples to be inserted
▪ in relational algebra, an insertion is expressed by:
r r  E
where r is a relation and E is a relational algebra expression.
▪ The insertion of a single tuple is expressed by letting E be a constant
relation containing one tuple.

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 Quick Review: Set Union Operation
▪ Notation: r  s
▪ Defined as:
r  s = {t | t  r or t  s}

▪ For r  s to be valid:
1. r, s must have the same arity
2. The attribute domains must be compatible

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 Quick Review: Set Union Operation
▪ Relations r, s: A B A B

 1  3
 2 s
 1
r

A B

▪ r  s:  1
 2
 1
 3

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 Insertion Examples
▪ Insert information in the database specifying that Smith has $1200 in
account A-973 at the Perryridge branch.

account  account  {(“A-973”, “Perryridge”, 1200)}

depositor  depositor  {(“Smith”, “A-973”)}

▪ Provide as a gift for all loan customers in the Perryridge branch, a

$200 savings account. Let the loan number serve as the account
number for the new savings account.
r1  (branch_name = “Perryridge” (borrower loan))
account  account  loan_number, branch_name, 200 (r1)
depositor  depositor  customer_name, loan_number (r1)

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 Updating

▪ A mechanism to change a value in a tuple without charging all values in

the tuple
▪ Use the generalized projection operator to do this task

▪ Each Fi is either
▪ the I th attribute of r, if the I th attribute is not updated, or,
▪ if the attribute is to be updated Fi is an expression, involving only
constants and the attributes of r, which gives the new value for the
attribute

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 Update Examples

▪ Make interest payments by increasing all balances by 5 percent.

account   account_number, branch_name, balance * 1.05 (account)

▪ Pay all accounts with balances over $10,000 6 percent interest

and pay all others 5 percent.

account   account_number, branch_name, balance * 1.06 (balance  10000 (account))

  account_number, branch_name, balance * 1.05 (balance  10000 (account))

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 Update Examples

▪ Pay a 10 percent bonus to all accounts with balances over $25,000.

Do not make bonus payments to other accounts.

account   account_number, branch_name, balance * 1.10 (balance  25000 (account))

  account_number, branch_name, balance (balance  25000 (account))

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 Exercises

Given relational schema:

Sailor (sid, sname, city, birthdate)
Boat (bid, bname, color)
SailorBoat (sid, bid, reservationdate)

1) Find the names of sailors who’ve reserved boat #103.

2) Find the names of sailors who’ve reserved a red boat.

3) Find the sailors who’ve reserved a red or a green boat.

4) Find the sailors who’ve reserved a red and a green boat.

5) Find the names of sailors who’ve reserved all boats.

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1) Find the names of sailors who’ve reserved boat #103

Solution 1: πsname(σbid = 103 (SailorBoat ⋈ Sailor))

Solution 2: temp1  σbid = 103 (SailorBoat)

temp2  temp1⋈ Sailor

πsname(temp2)

Solution 3: πsname((σbid = 103 SailorBoat) ⋈ Sailor)

Sailor (sid, sname, city, birthdate)

Boat (bid, bname, color)
SailorBoat (sid, bid, reservationdate)
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2) Find the names of sailors who’ve reserved a red boat

▪ Boat (bid, bname, color)

▪ Information about boat color only available in Boat relation; so, need an
extra join:

πsname((σcolor = ‘red’ Boat) ⋈ SailorBoat ⋈ Sailor)

A more efficient solution -- why more efficient?

πsname(πsid(πbid(σcolor = ‘red’ Boat) ⋈ SailorBoat) ⋈ Sailor)

A query optimizer can find this, given the first solution!

Sailor (sid, sname, city, birthdate)

Boat (bid, bname, color)
SailorBoat (sid, bid, reservationdate)
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3) Find the sailors who’ve reserved a red or a green boat

▪ Can identify all red or green boats, then find sailors who’ve reserved one
of these boats:

TempBoats  (σcolor = ‘red’  color = ‘green’ (Boat))

πsname(TempBoats ⋈ SailorBoat ⋈ Sailor)

What happens if  is replaced by  in this query?

Sailor (sid, sname, city, birthdate)

Boat (bid, bname, color)
SailorBoat (sid, bid, reservationdate)
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4) Find the sailors who’ve reserved a red and a green boat

▪ Previous approach won’t work! Why?

▪ Logically incorrect, an attribute can’t contain two different values
at the same time.

▪ Solution: Must identify sailors who’ve reserved red boats and

sailors who’ve reserved green boats.

▪ Then find the intersection (note that sid is a key for Sailor relation).

Sailor (sid, sname, city, birthdate)

Boat (bid, bname, color)
SailorBoat (sid, bid, reservationdate)
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4) Find the sailors who’ve reserved a red and a green boat

TempRed  πsid(σcolor = ‘red’ (Boat) ⋈ SailorBoat)

TempGreen  πsid(σcolor = ‘green’ (Boat) ⋈ SailorBoat)
πsname((TempRed ∩ TempGreen) ⋈ Sailor)

Sailor (sid, sname, city, birthdate)

Boat (bid, bname, color)
SailorBoat (sid, bid, reservationdate)
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5) Find the names of sailors who’ve reserved all boats

▪ Uses division; schemas of the input relations to division (/ or )

must be carefully chosen:

TempSids  πsid, bid(SailorBoat)  πbid(Boat)

πsname(TempSids ⋈ Sailor)

Sailor (sid, sname, city, birthdate)

Boat (bid, bname, color)
SailorBoat (sid, bid, reservationdate)
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5) Find the names of sailors who’ve reserved all boats

▪ Uses division; schemas of the input relations to division (/ or )

must be carefully chosen:

ρTempSids(πsid, bid(SailorBoat)  πbid(Boat)) Uses rename operator

instead of assignment
operator.

πsname(TempSids ⋈ Sailor)

Sailor (sid, sname, city, birthdate)

Boat (bid, bname, color)
SailorBoat (sid, bid, reservationdate)
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