Lecture 6

Functional Dependencies and

Normalization for Relational
Databases

Copyright © 2007 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe

Outline
 1 Informal Design Guidelines for Relational Databases
 1.1Semantics of the Relation Attributes
 1.2 Redundant Information in Tuples and Update Anomalies
 1.3 Null Values in Tuples

 2 Functional Dependencies (FDs)

 2.1 Definition of FD
 2.2 Inference Rules for FDs

Copyright © 2007 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 10- 3

Outline
 3 Normal Forms Based on Primary Keys
 3.1 Normalization of Relations
 3.2 Practical Use of Normal Forms
 3.3 Definitions of Keys and Attributes Participating in Keys
 3.4 First Normal Form
 3.5 Second Normal Form
 3.6 Third Normal Form

Copyright © 2007 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 10- 4

 Informal Design Guidelines for Relational
Databases
1.1 Semantics of the Relation Attributes
 GUIDELINE 1: Informally, each tuple in a relation should
represent one entity or relationship instance. (Applies to
individual relations and their attributes).
 Attributes of different entities (EMPLOYEEs,
DEPARTMENTs, PROJECTs) should not be mixed in the
same relation
 Only foreign keys should be used to refer to other entities
 Entity and relationship attributes should be kept apart as
much as possible.
 Bottom Line: Design a schema that can be explained
easily relation by relation. The semantics of attributes
should be easy to interpret.

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Figure 10.1 A simplified COMPANY
relational database schema

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1.2 Redundant Information in Tuples and
Update Anomalies

 Data redundancy is a condition in which the same

piece of data is held in two separate places
(different fields within a single database, or multiple
software environments or platforms).

 Information is stored redundantly

 Wastes storage
 Causes problems with update anomalies
 Insertion anomalies
 Deletion anomalies
 Modification anomalies
Copyright © 2007 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 10- 9
EXAMPLE OF AN UPDATE ANOMALY

 Consider the relation:

 EMP_PROJ(Emp#, Proj#, Ename, Pname,
No_hours)
 Update Anomaly:
 Changing the name of project number P1 from
“Billing” to “Customer-Accounting” may cause this
update to be made for all 100 employees working
on project P1.

Copyright © 2007 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 10- 10

EXAMPLE OF AN INSERT ANOMALY

 Consider the relation:

 EMP_PROJ(Emp#, Proj#, Ename, Pname,
No_hours)
 Insert Anomaly:
 Cannot insert a project unless an employee is
assigned to it.
 Conversely
 Cannot insert an employee unless he/she is
assigned to a project.

Copyright © 2007 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 10- 11

EXAMPLE OF AN DELETE ANOMALY

 Consider the relation:

 EMP_PROJ(Emp#, Proj#, Ename, Pname,
No_hours)
 Delete Anomaly:
 When a project is deleted, it will result in deleting
all the employees who work on that project.
 Alternately, if an employee is the sole employee on
a project, deleting that employee would result in
deleting the corresponding project.

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Figure 10.3 Two relation schemas
suffering from update anomalies

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Figure 10.4 Example States for
EMP_DEPT and EMP_PROJ

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Guideline to Redundant Information in
Tuples and Update Anomalies

 GUIDELINE 2:
 Design a schema that does not suffer from the
insertion, deletion and update anomalies.
 If there are any anomalies present, then note them
so that applications can be made to take them into
account.

Copyright © 2007 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 10- 15

1.3 Null Values in Tuples
 GUIDELINE 3:
 Relations should be designed such that their
tuples will have as few NULL values as possible
 Attributes that are NULL frequently could be
placed in separate relations (with the primary key)
 Reasons for nulls:
 Attribute not applicable or invalid
 Attribute value unknown (may exist)
 Value known to exist, but unavailable

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2.1 Functional Dependencies (1)
 Functional dependencies (FDs)
 Are used to specify formal measures of the
"goodness" of relational designs
 And keys are used to define normal forms for
relations
 Are constraints that are derived from the meaning
and interrelationships of the data attributes
 A set of attributes X functionally determines a set
of attributes Y if the value of X determines a unique
value for Y

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Functional Dependencies (2)
 X -> Y holds if whenever two tuples have the same value
for X, they must have the same value for Y
 For any two tuples t1 and t2 in any relation instance r(R): If
t1[X]=t2[X], then t1[Y]=t2[Y]
 X -> Y in R specifies a constraint on all relation instances
r(R)
 Written as X -> Y; can be displayed graphically on a
relation schema as in Figures. ( denoted by the arrow: ).
 FDs are derived from the real-world constraints on the
attributes

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Examples of FD constraints (1)
 Social security number determines employee
name
 SSN -> ENAME
 Project number determines project name and
location
 PNUMBER -> {PNAME, PLOCATION}
 Employee ssn and project number determines
the hours per week that the employee works on
the project
 {SSN, PNUMBER} -> HOURS

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Examples of FD constraints (2)
 An FD is a property of the attributes in the
schema R
 The constraint must hold on every relation
instance r(R)
 If K is a key of R, then K functionally determines
all attributes in R
 (since we never have two distinct tuples with
t1[K]=t2[K])

Copyright © 2007 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 10- 22

2.2 Inference Rules for FDs (1)
 Given a set of FDs F, we can infer additional FDs that
hold whenever the FDs in F hold
 Armstrong's inference rules:
 IR1. (Reflexive) If Y subset-of X, then X -> Y
 IR2. (Augmentation) If X -> Y, then XZ -> YZ
 (Notation: XZ stands for X U Z)
 IR3. (Transitive) If X -> Y and Y -> Z, then X -> Z

 IR1, IR2, IR3 form a sound and complete set of

inference rules
 These rules hold and all other rules that hold can be
deduced from these

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3 Normal Forms Based on Primary Keys

 3.1 Normalization of Relations

 3.2 Practical Use of Normal Forms
 3.3 Definitions of Keys and Attributes Participating
in Keys
 3.4 First Normal Form
 3.5 Second Normal Form
 3.6 Third Normal Form

Copyright © 2007 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 10- 29

3.1 Normalization of Relations (1)
 Normalization:
 The process of decomposing unsatisfactory "bad"
relations by breaking up their attributes into
smaller relations

 Normal form:
 Condition using keys and FDs of a relation to
certify whether a relation schema is in a particular
normal form

Copyright © 2007 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 10- 30

3.3 Definitions of Keys and Attributes
Participating in Keys (1)

 A superkey of a relation schema R = {A1, A2, ....,

An} is a set of attributes S subset-of R with the
property that no two tuples t1 and t2 in any legal
relation state r of R will have t1[S] = t2[S]

 A key K is a superkey with the additional

property that removal of any attribute from K will
cause K not to be a superkey any more.

Copyright © 2007 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 10- 33

Definitions of Keys and Attributes
Participating in Keys (2)

 If a relation schema has more than one key, each

is called a candidate key.
 One of the candidate keys is arbitrarily designated
to be the primary key, and the others are called
secondary keys.
 A Prime attribute must be a member of some
candidate key
 A Nonprime attribute is not a prime attribute—
that is, it is not a member of any candidate key.

Copyright © 2007 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 10- 34

3.2 First Normal Form
 Disallows
 composite attributes
 multivalued attributes
 nested relations; attributes whose values for an
individual tuple are non-atomic
 1NF
 Each cell must have a single value
 Each column must have data of the same data type
 Each row must be uniquely Identified – add unique
ID or add more columns to make each row unique.
Copyright © 2007 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 10- 35
Figure 10.8 Normalization into 1NF

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Figure 10.9 Normalization nested
relations into 1NF

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3.3 Second Normal Form (1)
 Uses the concepts of FDs, primary key
 Definitions
 Prime attribute: An attribute that is member of the primary
key K
 Full functional dependency: a FD Y -> Z where removal
of any attribute from Y means the FD does not hold any
more
 Examples:
 {SSN, PNUMBER} -> HOURS is a full FD since neither SSN
-> HOURS nor PNUMBER -> HOURS hold
 {SSN, PNUMBER} -> ENAME is not a full FD (it is called a
partial dependency ) since SSN -> ENAME also holds

Copyright © 2007 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 10- 38

Second Normal Form (2)
 A relation schema R is in second normal form
(2NF) if every non-prime attribute A in R is fully
functionally dependent on the primary key

 R can be decomposed into 2NF relations via the

process of 2NF normalization

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Figure 10.10 Normalizing into 2NF and
3NF

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3.4 Third Normal Form (1)
 Definition:
 Transitive functional dependency: a FD X -> Z
that can be derived from two FDs X -> Y and Y ->
Z
 Examples:
 SSN -> DMGRSSN is a transitive FD
 Since SSN -> DNUMBER and DNUMBER ->
DMGRSSN hold
 SSN -> ENAME is non-transitive
 Since there is no set of attributes X where SSN -> X
and X -> ENAME

Copyright © 2007 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 10- 41

Third Normal Form (2)
 A relation schema R is in third normal form (3NF) if it is
in 2NF and no non-prime attribute A in R is transitively
dependent on the primary key
 R can be decomposed into 3NF relations via the process
of 3NF normalization
 NOTE:
 In X -> Y and Y -> Z, with X as the primary key, we consider
this a problem only if Y is not a candidate key.
 When Y is a candidate key, there is no problem with the
transitive dependency .
 E.g., Consider EMP (SSN, Emp#, Salary ).
 Here, SSN -> Emp# -> Salary and Emp# is a candidate key.

Copyright © 2007 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 10- 42

Figure 10.11 Normalization into 2NF and
3NF

Copyright © 2007 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 10- 43

Normal Forms Defined Informally
 1st normal form
 All attributes depend on the key
 2nd normal form
 All attributes depend on the whole key
 3rd normal form
 All attributes depend on nothing but the key

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Normalization Example

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Normalization Example – Create a table
with data from the form
 Sample data is taken from two leases for two
different clients called John Kay and Aline
Stewart and is transformed into table format with
rows and column

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Normalization Example – 1NF
1. We identify the key attribute for the ClientRental
unnormalized table as clientNo.
2. Next, we identify the repeating group in the
unnormalized table as the property rented
details, which repeats for each client.
3. The structure of the repeating group is:

 Repeating Group = (propertyNo, pAddress,

rentStart, rentFinish, rent, ownerNo, oName)

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Normalization Example – 1NF
 To transform an unnormalized table into 1NF, we
ensure that there is a single value at the intersection
of each row and column.
 This is achieved by removing the repeating group by:
 removing the repeating group (property rented details)
by entering the appropriate client data into each row.
 removing the repeating group (property rented details)
by placing the repeating data along with a copy of the
original key attribute (clientNo) in a separate relation

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Normalization Example – First Approach

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Normalization Example – Second Approach

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Normalization Example – 2NF - FDs

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Normalization Example – FDs
 The ClientRental relation has the following
functional dependencies:

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Normalization Example – 2NF
 Second normal form relations derived from the ClientRental relation. The
ClientRental relation has the following functional dependencies:

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 Normalization Example – FDs - 3NF
 The functional dependencies for the Client, Rental, and PropertyOwner
relations are as follows:
 Client
 fd2 clientNo ® cName (Primary key)
 Rental
 fd1 clientNo, propertyNo ® rentStart, rentFinish (Primary key)
 fd5' clientNo, rentStart ® propertyNo, rentFinish (Candidate key)
 fd6' propertyNo, rentStart ® clientNo, rentFinish (Candidate key)
 PropertyOwner
 fd3 propertyNo ® pAddress, rent, ownerNo, oName (Primary key)
 fd4 ownerNo ® oName (Transitive dependency)

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 Normalization Example – FDs - 3NF
 The PropertyForRent and Owner relations are in 3NF, as there
are no further transitive dependencies on the primary key.

 All the non-primary-key attributes within the PropertyOwner

relation are functionally dependent on the primary key, with the
exception of oName, which is transitively dependent on
ownerNo

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 Normalization Example – FDs - 3NF
 To transform the PropertyOwner relation into 3NF, we must first
remove this transitive dependency by creating two new relations
called PropertyForRent and Owner.

 The new relations have the following form:

 PropertyForRent (propertyNo, pAddress, rent, ownerNo)
 Owner (ownerNo, oName)

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Normalization Example – FDs - 3NF

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Chapter Outline
 Informal Design Guidelines for Relational
Databases
 Functional Dependencies (FDs)
 Definition, Inference Rules, Equivalence of Sets of
FDs, Minimal Sets of FDs
 Normal Forms Based on Primary Keys
 General Normal Form Definitions (For Multiple
Keys)

Copyright © 2007 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 10- 66