Introduction

Question 1

What is the difference between data and information?

Answer 1

Data is raw, unprocessed facts while information is processed data that provides knowledge about facts

Question 2

What is the relationship between data, classes and instances?

Answer 2

Data can be grouped into classes (categories) and represented as instances

Question 3

Define information system (IS)

Answer 3

An IS collects, classifies and processes information to support decision making

Question 4

Difference between information system and computer system

Answer 4

Computer system is hardware and software for processing data, while IS uses it to manage information for decision-making

Question 5

Drawbacks of file systems for data management

Answer 5

Poor abstraction for modeling data
Difficulty accessing information
Limited sharing mechanisms
Insufficient protection and integrity constraints
Lack of administrative tools

Question 6

Characteristics of a DBMS?

Answer 6

Large persistent and shared data
High level data abstraction
Program-data independence
Efficient and effective data management
Includes fault tolerance, access control and concurrency control

Question 7

Why is DBMS preferred over a file system?

Answer 7

Better abstraction
better integrity
better fault tolerance
efficiency
complex data structures
shared data management

Question 8

Describe DBMS market

Answer 8

Dominated by Oracle, IBM, Microsoft
Some open source systems like MySQL and PostgreSQL
Alternatives to rdbms like NoSQL

Question 9

DBMS can operate in both

Answer 9

centralized and distributed configurations

Question 10

Why can’t excel be considered DSBMS

Answer 10

Lacks fault tolerance
Lacks concurrency control
No high-level data abstraction

Question 11

What are the static, functional and dynamic aspects of a database

Answer 11

Static: Structure and storage
Functional: Operations that can be performed on the data
Dynamic: Changes and transactions over time