Using the REA Data Model in Order to Reduce Design Complexity in an Inventory Management Relational Database, and the Need for a Relational Database Complexity Metric.

Abstract

With the extensive use of relational databases in the business environment there is a need to reduce database complexity in order to avoid data inconsistency and redundancy, which can provide a company with unreliable and/or meaningless data and information. \nThe use of the REA Data Model in database design can significantly help with this problem. \xa0The model can eliminate the need for unnecessary data artifacts which should only be generated by the system when needed. \nThis paper also addresses the need for a Relational Database Complexity Metric. A simple and easy to understand metric is presented.