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Re-engineering Relational Normal Forms in an Object-Oriented Framework

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Abstract

In relational database design, the normal forms have long served as a guide to the proper dispersion of application attributes across multiple tables. These canonical formats, ranging from First to Fifth Normal Form, enforce increasingly complex constraints to foreclose more and more subtle opportunities for inconsistency in the application data. Although object-oriented database design disperses application attributes across classes rather than tables, constraint enforcement remains an important concern. In the transition from a relational to an object-oriented environment, the database designer must reconcile normalization processes with newer approaches that identify the core application classes (e.g., Jacobson’s Objectory, Rumbaugh’s Object Modeling Technique, or Booch’s method). In particular, the reengineering of a legacy system may involve the study of a relational design in which normal forms were used to establish the database tables. This paper reviews relational normal forms, interprets them in an object-oriented context, and provide guidelines to port relational normal forms to an object-oriented database.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Western Washington University, Bellingham, Washington, 98225, USA

    James L. Johnson

  2. Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia

    George Fernandez

Authors
  1. James L. Johnson
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  2. George Fernandez
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. School of Information Technology, University of Queensland, Q4072, Brisbane, Australia

    Maria E. Orlowska

  2. Johann Wolfgang Goethe-Universität, Frankfurt am Main, Germany

    Roberto Zicari

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© 1998 Springer-Verlag London Limited

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Johnson, J.L., Fernandez, G. (1998). Re-engineering Relational Normal Forms in an Object-Oriented Framework. In: Orlowska, M.E., Zicari, R. (eds) OOIS’97. Springer, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4471-1525-0_36

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4471-1525-0_36

  • Publisher Name: Springer, London

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-540-76170-9

  • Online ISBN: 978-1-4471-1525-0

  • eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive

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