Type Inheritance and Relational Theory

The basic ideas of type inheritance—and the languages and products supporting those ideas—have been around for many years. However, those languages and products are typically quite ad hoc, and they all exhibit surprising—not to say undesirable—behavior on occasion. Why? Because there has never been any consensus on a well-defined type inheritance model on which such languages and products might be built. In this video seminar, internationally recognized relational database expert C.J. Date describes a formal, abstract, rigorous, and robust alternative to this state of affairs by taking you through a detailed explanation of the inheritance model that he and his colleague Hugh Darwen first described in The Third Manifesto. Designed for data and database professionals, the course examines single and multiple inheritance; scalar, tuple, and relation inheritance; type lattices and union and intersection types; polymorphism and substitutability; compile time and run time binding; and a detailed discussion and analysis of inheritance as supported in the SQL standard.

• Explore and understand the inheritance model proposed in The Third Manifesto
• Understand why the model is necessary, its components, and its unifying characteristics
• Examine alternative inheritance schemes and the pertinent features of the SQL standard
• Enjoy a rare opportunity to learn from one of the model’s co-inventors
• Examine the model in detail

C.J. Date is an internationally known author, lecturer, researcher, and consultant, specializing in relational database technology. A Computing Industry Hall of Fame inductee, C.J. is best known for his book An Introduction to Database Systems (8th edition, Addison-Wesley, 2004), which has sold more than 900,000 copies and is used in colleges and universities worldwide. In addition to the O’Reilly title Type Inheritance and Relational Theory: Subtypes, Supertypes, and Substitutability, C.J. has authored more than twenty other O’Reilly titles including, SQL and Relational Theory, The New Relational Database Dictionary, and Relational Theory for Computer Professionals.