All of today’s mainstream database products support the SQL language, and relational theory is what SQL is supposed to be based on. But are those products truly relational? Sadly, the answer is no. In this video, Chris Date—author, lecturer, researcher, and consultant, specializing in relational database technology—shows you what a real relational product would be like, and how and why it would be so much better than what’s currently available.

With this video, you will:

• Learn how to see database systems as programming systems
• Get a careful, precise, and detailed definition of the relational model
• Explore a detailed analysis of SQL from a relational point of view

There are literally hundreds of resources on relational theory or the SQL language or both. But this video is different. First, nobody is more qualified than Chris Date to deliver this material. He and Ted Codd, inventor of the relational model, were colleagues for many years, and Chris’s involvement with the technology goes back to the time of Codd’s first papers in 1969 and 1970. Second, most books try to use SQL as a vehicle for teaching relational theory, but this Chris Date deliberately takes the opposite approach in this video. His primary aim is to teach relational theory as such. Then he uses that theory as a vehicle for teaching SQL, showing in particular how that theory can help with the practical problem of using SQL correctly and productively.

Any computer professional who wants to understand what relational systems are all about can benefit from this video. No prior knowledge of databases is assumed.