adatbázisintegritási

Adatbázisintegritás refers to the accuracy, consistency, and reliability of data within a database. It ensures that the data is valid and usable for its intended purpose throughout its lifecycle. Maintaining database integrity is crucial for applications that rely on accurate information, such as financial systems, inventory management, and patient records.

There are several types of database integrity. Entity integrity ensures that each row in a table has a unique identifier, typically through a primary key. This prevents duplicate records and allows for unambiguous referencing of individual entries. Referential integrity focuses on the relationships between tables. It ensures that foreign key values in one table accurately reference existing primary key values in another table, preventing orphaned records or inconsistent links between data. Domain integrity restricts the type of data that can be entered into a column, ensuring that values fall within a predefined range or set of acceptable values, such as enforcing a specific data type (e.g., integer, date) or a list of allowed options. Finally, user-defined integrity allows for the creation of custom rules that go beyond the standard integrity constraints, catering to specific business logic or application requirements.

Database management systems (DBMS) provide mechanisms to enforce these integrity constraints, such as primary key constraints, foreign key constraints, check constraints, and NOT NULL constraints. By implementing and maintaining these constraints, organizations can significantly reduce data errors, improve data quality, and ensure the trustworthiness of their information assets. Failure to maintain database integrity can lead to incorrect reporting, flawed decision-making, and operational inefficiencies.