Gorman has written a new breed of database reference book. It is based on the standards work done by the ANSI X3J4 committee, and its organization follows the DBMS components standardized by the ANSI Network Data Language (NDL). This organization is both a strength and a weakness.

The purpose of the book is to be a tutorial describing the components of a DBMS. The description is in enough detail so that evaluators can choose quality DBMSs for their own use. Many current DBMS packages fit ANSI X3J4 standards, but they can be of poor quality for specific applications. In general, the text fulfills its intended purpose, but it is written for those who already have a significant background in database technology.

The first chapter is devoted to the history and content of database standards. It includes a discussion of CODASYL, ANSI/SPARC, and ISO, and their efforts toward standardizing DBMS models. It also describes the current NDL, SQL, and IRDS data models in general terms. The chapter is an excellent summary of how the standardization process works among the various committees and subcommittees.

Chapter 2 describes what is meant by static and dynamic applications and how DBMSs support them. Some DBMSs, normally using linked list relationships, are excellent for supporting production applications where the data relationships are static or unchanging. Others, using indexes and relational techniques, are best for supporting ad hoc processing and variable or dynamic data relationships. The chapter concludes with a discussion of flexibility and performance issues for these two classes of DBMSs.

The third chapter discusses logical database design features. It includes a definition of logical database components, data models, and data definition language. The longest part of the chapter is a discussion of logical data relationships and how they are represented in static and dynamic data models.

The fourth chapter covers physical database components that govern performance and space utilization. Storage structures, access strategies, data loading, and data updating are all compared in general terms for static and dynamic relationship DBMSs. The discussion includes some performance comparisons for various indexing and list processing techniques.

The interrogation chapter discusses the various categories of languages used to define (via subschemas), access, modify, and report data from a database. The chapter also mentions (but does not emphasize) a number of important guidelines for selecting interrogation facilities. Host language interface, procedure-oriented languages, report writers, and query-update languages are all given good coverage. No caution is given about accidentally violating DeMorgan’s Law with query languages that allow negative logic to be used with Boolean OR operators. In general, the discussion is oriented more toward the theoretical capabilities of various classes of DBMSs than toward specific DBMS packages. Such a discussion would normally allow readers to choose the class of DBMS best suited to their needs, but in this case the comparisons are too vague to let the reader make a good judgment.

The final chapter addresses system controls that influence database access, operation, and protection. Backup and recovery are covered in some detail, with references to audit logs and transaction processing. The section on database reorganization covers logical restructuring of the database records and relationships as well as physical reorganization to improve operational efficiency. Discussions of the problems inherent in concurrent operations, multiple database processing, and security and privacy follow. The chapter concludes with some words of wisdom on DBMS initialization and on optimization of application processing.

The entire text includes only ten references, all of which are reports published in ACM SIGMOD Record, ACM SIGMOD Bulletin, ANSI/X3/SPARC Study Group reports, or IEC/ISO reports. None of the excellent textbooks or vendor texts on the market are used as references.

Overall, the book is a good, up-to-date look at mainframe DBMSs from the ANSI definitional perspective. It lacks discussion of minicomputer and microcomputer DBMS packages, which are not necessarily implemented in the same way as their mainframe counterparts. The table of contents is good, but the index is inadequate. (The index fails to show where any commercial DBMSs are discussed in the text.) Another weakness is in the form of the tables and figures. Instead of the crisp graphics appropriate for textbooks, these appear to have been generated by a word processor.

The text is a useful reference for those wanting to know the range of topics addressed by a DBMS and the current ANSI standards work in these areas. The book is not a comparative analysis of various DBMS packages, but it lists almost all subjects that could be used to make such a comparison. The book contains no exercises and would be difficult to use as a classroom text.