Excellent, for practitioners and beginners. Other reviews are a puzzle
11/6/2006
I was almost put off buying this book by some of the very negative reviews. I bought the book. I have designed a few databases but that is not my main job, and I wanted to get up to speed on database design and use for a short project that I am leading. I have bought several books on the subject, and this is one of the most useful. The book is detailed, which means that if you want to go into detail you can, e.g. on what normal form is and how to use it, of the difference between relational and OO design. However, the book is designed so that one does not have to go into detail, one can get a good overview of the subject and start creating databases soon after reading it. Perhaps this book offends some tecchy purists, but most business people who need to understand databases will find this book valuable.
Great purchase
3/8/2007
This book was required by a course I am taking, so I can not buy another one, but I think it is a great book. It has also helps you learn a database language. I forgot what it is bec I did nt use it yet, but it very helpful.
incorrectly named
4/20/2007
It should be named "how to writing SQL for MS Access, Oracle 7i and xxx" since that is all about. It is weird to me why "Design" is in the title. There is absolutely nothing covered on what is inside a RMDB, man.
Good book for databases
3/26/2008
I purchased this book for a Database Management Systems course and found it to be a very useful text-book. The concepts are easy to understand and the authors provide plenty of examples for better understanding.
My only problem was that our course instructor used the same examples as the book in class and that got boring towards the end of the semester.
However, overall I believe that the book is very useful and will definitely recommend it to friends.
Not for the classroom
5/14/2008
For two quarters now, I have had a one-chapter reading assignment out of this book for a total of 20 chapters. This book is nearly impossible to read. The only reason you would want a text this expansive is if you planned to write your own database system to compete with MySQL, PostgreSQL, etc..