Lecture # 3

Database Systems
Muhammad Aamir Khan
The Network Database Model
 A major deficiency of the hierarchical
model is the fact that common
 many-to-many relationships cannot be hold

 e.g. each student can take many courses and

each course can have many students is difficult
to implement in a hierarchical model

 To overcome some of the deficiencies of

the hierarchical model, the network model
was created
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The Network Database Model
 It was created to represent complex data
relationships more effectively then the
hierarchal model could

 It was also designed to improve

database performance and to impose
database standards

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Network Model
 The network model is very similar to the
hierarchical model
 In fact, the hierarchical model is a subset of
network model

 Child tables are allowed to have more then

one parent. This allowed the network
model to support many-to-many
relationships

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 Network Model Example

CUSTOMER SALES PERSON

ORDER 1 ORDER 2

LIST ITEM 1 LIST ITEM 2 LIST ITEM 1 LIST ITEM 2

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Network Model Example

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Network Databases
 The network database model was designed to
solve some of the more serious problems with the
hierarchical database model
 Specifically, the network model solves the problem of
data redundancy by representing relationships in terms
of sets rather then a hierarchy

 The model have its own origins in the conference

on Data Systems Languages (CODASYL).

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Disadvantage of Network Model
 System Complexity: Database
integrity control and efficiency with
which the network model manages
relationships is not user friendly

 Lack of Structural Independence: It

remains difficult to make structural
changes in the network databases, and
some structural changes are impossible

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Disadvantage of Network Model
 largely replace by the relational database
model in 1980’s

 The Network Model is for all practical

purposes obsolete

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Evolution of DB Systems

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 That’s it for today!

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