Designing Quality Databases With IDEF1X Information Models

This comprehensive text shows how to use IDEF1X information models to specify business information requirements, policies, and rules, and describes how to use these specifications to design and build high-quality database applications.

Managers, systems professionals, and students will benefit from this thorough description of information modeling and database design with IDEF1X.

Part One presents the general concepts behind databases, information management, and information modeling in the context of Zachman's Framework for Information Systems Architecture.

Part Two fully describes the symbols and semantics of IDEF1X, and speculates about the future of information modeling as well as the evolution of the IDEF1X language to support object-oriented and rule-based systems development.

Part Three provides an extensive case study of a California produce market, employing the concepts introduced in the book.

Chapter-end exercises and references, eight appendices, a glossary, an index, and more than 300 figures and tables complete the text.

THOMAS A. BRUCE is a Senior Systems Engineer and Vice President with Bank of America. For more than twenty years, he has been involved with all aspects of information systems development and has specialized in business application development and management, systems architecture, database administration, and data administration.

A California native and graduate of the University of California, Tom holds a Masters degree in physics from Cornell University. He is founder and principal of Berkeley-based T.A.B.S.E.T.; author of numerous articles on database, CASE, and repositories; and a frequent speaker on topics ranging from the Zachman Framework to future information management directions.

A devout technocrat of Scottish descent, Tom claims to never have enough time for favorite hobbies, like learning more about gourmet food and wine, chasing deer from the garden of his Berkeley Hills home, or really getting back in shape. A national-champion gymnast in an earlier era, he hopes someday to have another go at the flying trapeze.