CP363 : Exam Sample Questions

This document contains a list of sample questions for the Exam. Some of these questions, or questions very much like them but in a different format, may appear on the Exam.

You may also be required to write SQL SELECT statements as you did for Test 2 for similar types of data from the DCRIS database.

  1. Describe the differences between discretionary and mandatory security mechanisms. Give specific examples of each. You may not use examples from the text, lectures, or on-line notes.


  2. Describe the difference between horizontal and vertical fragmentation of data. Give a specific example of each. You may not use examples from the text, lectures, or on-line notes.


  3. Describe the differences between centralized and distributed databases , mentioning their respective benefits and drawbacks, their organization, and their physical set up. Give a real-world example of each. You may not use examples from the text, lectures, or on-line notes.


  4. Briefly explain two phase locking . What are the two kinds of locking involved in two-phase locking?


  5. Possible concurrency problems include Lost Updates , Dirty Reads , Incorrect Summaries , and Unrepeatable Reads. Describe and give an example of one of these problems. You may not use examples from the text, lectures, or on-line notes.


  6. List and briefly explain the basic (ACID) transaction properties.


  7. Briefly explain how you could use database privileges to implement mandatory security.


  8. Describe the concept of serialization.


  9. Describe the differences between a commit and a rollback.


  10. Describe the concept of deadlock. What causes it, and how can it be fixed?


  11. Describe the concept of granularity.


  12. Name and describe two types of database failures.


  13. Describe the purpose of a SQL trigger.


  14. Give a specific, real world example of a SQL trigger. You need not provide SQL code, just describe what it does and why. You may not use examples from the text, lectures, or on-line notes.


  15. Describe the differences between a row-level and a statement-level trigger.


  16. Describe the purpose of a SQL view.


  17. Give a specific, real world example of a SQL view. You need not provide SQL code, just describe what it does and why. You may not use examples from the text, lectures, or on-line notes.


  18. Name and describe two types of database concurrency.


  19. Give a specific, real world example of a Lost Update. You may not use examples from the text, lectures, or on-line notes.


  20. Give a specific, real world example of a Dirty Read. You may not use examples from the text, lectures, or on-line notes.


  21. Give a specific, real world example of an Unrepeatable Read. You may not use examples from the text, lectures, or on-line notes.


  22. Give a specific, real world example of an Incorrect Summary. You may not use examples from the text, lectures, or on-line notes.


  23. List and describe the transaction states.


  24. Describe the differences between a system failure and media failure and give examples of each.


  25. Briefly describe how a database can recover from a system failure.


  26. Briefly describe how a database can recover from a media failure.


  27. Describe how logs are scanned in order to recover from a failure.


  28. Describe the concept and purpose of a mirror log.


  29. Describe purpose of a checkpoint and the checkpoint algorithm.


  30. Describe what is meant when a transaction is said to be serializable.


  31. List the database granularity objects in size from smallest to largest.


  32. Describe the differences between fine and coarse granularity. What are the performance trade-offs between each?


  33. Describe the concept and purpose of a lock table.


  34. Describe the differences between the two kinds of multiple mode locks.


  35. Describe the purpose of locking .


  36. Describe the two kinds of physical database updating.


  37. Describe how recovery is handled in a multidatabase system.


  38. Describe how statistical database access security is implemented. Give a specific example.


  39. Describe how a system log can help administrators trace security violations after the fact.


  40. Give the reasons why security is implemented on databases at all.


  41. Describe the two privilege levels of discretionary access control.


  42. List and describe the access privileges that may be applied to a table.


  43. Describe the purpose of the grant option.


  44. Describe the two data access restrictions of mandatory access control.


  45. Describe the three types of multiprocessor system architecture.


  46. Name and briefly describe the four types of database transparency for a distributed database.


  47. Name the overhead issues that distributed databases must deal with.


  48. Name and describe the three types of distributed database systems.


  49. Name and describe the problems unique to a distributed database environment.