DBMS Relational Algebra

In this tutorial, we will discuss Relational Algebra. In the previous tutorial, we

had a brief discussion on the basics of relational algebra and calculus where we
learned the need to use these theoretical mathematical systems.

What is Relational Algebra in DBMS?

Relational algebra is a procedural query language that works on relational
model. The purpose of a query language is to retrieve data from database
or perform various operations such as insert, update, delete on the data.
When I say that relational algebra is a procedural query language, it means that it
tells what data to be retrieved and how to be retrieved.

On the other hand relational calculus is a non-procedural query language,

which means it tells what data to be retrieved but doesn’t tell how to
retrieve it. We will discuss relational calculus in a separate tutorial.

Types of operations in relational algebra

We have divided these operations in two categories:
1. Basic Operations
2. Derived Operations

Basic/Fundamental Operations:
1. Select (σ)
2. Project (∏)
3. Union (∪)
4. Set Difference (-)
5. Cartesian product (X)
6. Rename (ρ)

Derived Operations:

2. Left, Right, Full outer join (⟕, ⟖, ⟗)

1. Natural Join (⋈)

3. Intersection (∩)
4. Division (÷)
Lets discuss these operations one by one with the help of examples.

Select Operator (σ)

Select Operator is denoted by sigma (σ) and it is used to find the tuples (or rows)
in a relation (or table) which satisfy the given condition.

If you understand little bit of SQL then you can think of it as a where clause in
SQL, which is used for the same purpose.

Syntax of Select Operator (σ)

σ Condition/Predicate(Relation/Table name)
Select Operator (σ) Example
Table: CUSTOMER
---------------

Customer_Id Customer_Name Customer_City

----------- ------------- -------------
C10100 Steve Agra
C10111 Raghu Agra
C10115 Chaitanya Noida
C10117 Ajeet Delhi
C10118 Carl Delhi
Query:

σ Customer_City="Agra" (CUSTOMER)
Output:

Customer_Id Customer_Name Customer_City

----------- ------------- -------------
C10100 Steve Agra
C10111 Raghu Agra

Important points about Select operation

 The select: Select operator is Unary, which means it is applied to a

single relation only. The selection operation is commutative that is,
 The degree (number of attributes) of the resulting relation from a
Selection operation is the same as the degree of the Relation given.

Project Operator (∏)

Project operator is denoted by ∏ symbol and it is used to select desired columns
(or attributes) from a table (or relation).

Project operator in relational algebra is similar to the Select statement in SQL.

Syntax of Project Operator (∏)

∏ column_name1, column_name2, ...., column_nameN(table_name)

Project Operator (∏) Example
In this example, we have a table CUSTOMER with three columns, we want to
fetch only two columns of the table, which we can do with the help of Project
Operator ∏.

Table: CUSTOMER

Customer_Id Customer_Name Customer_City

----------- ------------- -------------
C10100 Steve Agra
C10111 Raghu Agra
C10115 Chaitanya Noida
C10117 Ajeet Delhi
C10118 Carl Delhi
Query:

∏ Customer_Name, Customer_City (CUSTOMER)

Output:

Customer_Name Customer_City
------------- -------------
Steve Agra
Raghu Agra
Chaitanya Noida
Ajeet Delhi
Carl Delhi

Union Operator (∪)

Union operator is denoted by ∪ symbol and it is used to select all the rows
(tuples) from two tables (relations).

Lets discuss union operator a bit more. Lets say we have two relations R1 and
R2 both have same columns and we want to select all the tuples(rows) from
these relations then we can apply the union operator on these relations.

Note: The rows (tuples) that are present in both the tables will only appear once
in the union set. In short you can say that there are no duplicates present after
the union operation.

Syntax of Union Operator (∪)

table_name1 ∪ table_name2
Union Operator (∪) Example
Table 1: COURSE

Course_Id Student_Name Student_Id

--------- ------------ ----------
C101 Aditya S901
C104 Aditya S901
C106 Steve S911
C109 Paul S921
C115 Lucy S931
Table 2: STUDENT

Student_Id Student_Name Student_Age

------------ ---------- -----------
S901 Aditya 19
S911 Steve 18
S921 Paul 19
S931 Lucy 17
S941 Carl 16
S951 Rick 18
Query:

∏ Student_Name (COURSE) ∪ ∏ Student_Name (STUDENT)

Output:

Student_Name
------------
Aditya
Carl
Paul
Lucy
Rick
Steve
Note: As you can see there are no duplicate names present in the output even
though we had few common names in both the tables, also in the COURSE table
we had the duplicate name itself.

Intersection Operator (∩)

Intersection operator is denoted by ∩ symbol and it is used to select common
rows (tuples) from two tables (relations).

Lets say we have two relations R1 and R2 both have same columns and we want
to select all those tuples(rows) that are present in both the relations, then in that
case we can apply intersection operation on these two relations R1 ∩ R2.

Note: Only those rows that are present in both the tables will appear in the result
set.

Syntax of Intersection Operator (∩)

table_name1 ∩ table_name2
Intersection Operator (∩) Example
Lets take the same example that we have taken above.
Table 1: COURSE

Course_Id Student_Name Student_Id

--------- ------------ ----------
C101 Aditya S901
C104 Aditya S901
C106 Steve S911
C109 Paul S921
C115 Lucy S931
Table 2: STUDENT

Student_Id Student_Name Student_Age

------------ ---------- -----------
S901 Aditya 19
S911 Steve 18
S921 Paul 19
S931 Lucy 17
S941 Carl 16
S951 Rick 18
Query:

∏ Student_Name (COURSE) ∩ ∏ Student_Name (STUDENT)

Output:

Student_Name
------------
Aditya
Steve
Paul
Lucy

Set Difference (-)

Set Difference is denoted by – symbol. Lets say we have two relations R1 and
R2 and we want to select all those tuples(rows) that are present in Relation R1
but not present in Relation R2, this can be done using Set difference R1 – R2.

Syntax of Set Difference (-)

table_name1 - table_name2
Set Difference (-) Example
Lets take the same tables COURSE and STUDENT that we have seen above.

Query:
Lets write a query to select those student names that are present in STUDENT
table but not present in COURSE table.

∏ Student_Name (STUDENT) - ∏ Student_Name (COURSE)

Output:
Student_Name
------------
Carl
Rick

Cartesian product (X)

Cartesian Product is denoted by X symbol. Lets say we have two relations R1
and R2 then the cartesian product of these two relations (R1 X R2) would
combine each tuple of first relation R1 with the each tuple of second relation R2. I
know it sounds confusing but once we take an example of this, you will be able to
understand this.

Syntax of Cartesian product (X)

R1 X R2
Cartesian product (X) Example
Table 1: R

Col_A Col_B
----- ------
AA 100
BB 200
CC 300
Table 2: S

Col_X Col_Y
----- -----
XX 99
YY 11
ZZ 101
Query:
Lets find the cartesian product of table R and S.

R X S
Output:

Col_A Col_B Col_X Col_Y

----- ------ ------ ------
AA 100 XX 99
AA 100 YY 11
AA 100 ZZ 101
BB 200 XX 99
BB 200 YY 11
BB 200 ZZ 101
CC 300 XX 99
CC 300 YY 11
CC 300 ZZ 101
Note: The number of rows in the output will always be the cross product of
number of rows in each table. In our example table 1 has 3 rows and table 2 has
3 rows so the output has 3×3 = 9 rows.

Rename (ρ)
Rename (ρ) operation can be used to rename a relation or an attribute of a
relation.
Rename (ρ) Syntax:
ρ(new_relation_name, old_relation_name)

Rename (ρ) Example

Lets say we have a table customer, we are fetching customer names and we are
renaming the resulted relation to CUST_NAMES.

Table: CUSTOMER

Customer_Id Customer_Name Customer_City

----------- ------------- -------------
C10100 Steve Agra
C10111 Raghu Agra
C10115 Chaitanya Noida
C10117 Ajeet Delhi
C10118 Carl Delhi
Query:

ρ(CUST_NAMES, ∏(Customer_Name)(CUSTOMER))
Output:

CUST_NAMES
----------
Steve
Raghu
Chaitanya
Ajeet
Carl

DBMS Relational Calculus

BY CHAITANYA SINGH | FILED UNDER: DBMS

In the previous tutorial, we discussed Relational Algebra which is a procedural

query language. In this tutorial, we will discuss Relational Calculus, which is a
non-procedural query language.

What is Relational Calculus?

Relational calculus is a non-procedural query language that tells the system what
data to be retrieved but doesn’t tell how to retrieve it.

Types of Relational Calculus

1. Tuple Relational Calculus (TRC)

Tuple relational calculus is used for selecting those tuples that satisfy the given
condition.
Table: Student

First_Name Last_Name Age

---------- --------- ----
Ajeet Singh 30
Chaitanya Singh 31
Rajeev Bhatia 27
Carl Pratap 28
Lets write relational calculus queries.
Query to display the last name of those students where age is greater than 30

{ t.Last_Name | Student(t) AND t.age > 30 }

In the above query you can see two parts separated by | symbol. The second
part is where we define the condition and in the first part we specify the fields
which we want to display for the selected tuples.

The result of the above query would be:

Last_Name
---------
Singh
Query to display all the details of students where Last name is ‘Singh’

{ t | Student(t) AND t.Last_Name = 'Singh' }

Output:

First_Name Last_Name Age

---------- --------- ----
Ajeet Singh 30
Chaitanya Singh 31

2. Domain Relational Calculus (DRC)

In domain relational calculus the records are filtered based on the domains.
Again we take the same table to understand how DRC works.
Table: Student

First_Name Last_Name Age

---------- --------- ----
Ajeet Singh 30
Chaitanya Singh 31
Rajeev Bhatia 27
Carl Pratap 28
Query to find the first name and age of students where student age is greater
than 27

{< First_Name, Age > | ∈ Student ∧ Age > 27}

The symbols used for logical operators are: ∧ for AND, ∨ for OR and ┓ for NOT.
Note:

Output:

First_Name Age
---------- ----
Ajeet 30
Chaitanya 31
Carl 28