<– 3 – Compressing Data | 5 – Protecting Data: Heuristics, Security, and Encryption –>
Learning Objectives
After completing this unit students will be able to:
- Recognize the uses of spreadsheets and how they relate to databases
- Manipulate and chart/graph data to show different trends
- Distinguish between variables and constants
- Describe what a function is and why they are so important
- Calculate data using functions
- Create a visual representation of the data they are manipulating
- Describe big data and how it differs from “regular” data
- Identify the global impact of big data, including its shortcomings
Suggested Reading
- Blown to Bits, Chapter 4 – Needles in the Haystack. pp 109-160
- Nine Algorithms that Changed the Future, Chapter 8 – Databases: The Quest for Consistency. pp 122-148
Important Vocab
- Atomic transaction – transaction where all components must be carried out before the transaction is considered complete such that all occur or none occur
- Big Data – sets of data that are larger than a consumer software application can handle
- Consistency – refers to the fact that information from one table does not contradict itself in any other table throughout a database
- Deadlock – when, in a database, two transactions are trying to lock the same row and neither can continue until the other is complete
- Fault-tolerance – the ability for a system to continue to run properly even if one piece fails
- Idempotency – when an operation results in the same end result no matter how many times it is performed
- Keys – a database column that holds a unique value that distinguishes each record from others
- Relational database – a database that has multiple tables that are connected by the use of unique keys
- Rollback – returning back to the state of a database before the write-ahead log began
- Two-phase Commit Protocol – a standardized way for databases to make sure all transactions are able to write without any inconsistencies before committing
- Virtual Tables – temporary tables that are made up of parts of other tables that help in reducing redundant data
- Write-ahead Logging – a method for avoiding inconsistencies in which all transactions are written and saved to a log before they are applied to a database
<– 3 – Compressing Data | 5 – Protecting Data: Heuristics, Security, and Encryption –>