Furthermore, this book does a good job of straddling the schism that's begun to open up in the world of database architecture. Perhaps better than any other volume, this book documents the emerging object-relational strategy for representing data fairly, although most of the authors' coverage (as is fitting) goes to the more firmly established and better-supported relational database model. The authors' style intersperses sequences of theory-oriented prose and diagrams with queries and other listings that have to do with specific implementations, allowing readers to observe many of the phenomena described here. This book is a fine picture of the state of the art, painted with influences from business as well as information science. --David Wall
Topics covered: Modern database design and operation, including basic Structured Query Language (SQL), Object-Relational SQL and the object-relational model, indexing, query parsing, and performance-minded design.