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GATE CSE Database Management Systems — practice questions

Explore 56 free Database Management Systems questions in GATE CSE Computer Science. Open each question or exercise to read its content, reference answers and available explanation.

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Database Management Systems questions and exercises with answers

Showing questions 1–30 of 56.

Using the library analogy, what does the DBMS correspond to?Read the answer and worked solution →A schema is best described, in the menu analogy, asRead the answer and worked solution →Per the kitchen-brigade analogy, the relational model's three pillars areRead the answer and worked solution →A relation is, in formal terms,Read the answer and worked solution →A foreign key is the relational analogue ofRead the answer and worked solution →Project differs from Select in thatRead the answer and worked solution →If $|R| = 200$ tuples and $|S| = 50$ tuples, how many tuples does $R \times S$ contain?Read the answer and worked solution →Age is best modelled as which kind of attribute?Read the answer and worked solution →Per the NPTEL lecture, an entity set isRead the answer and worked solution →The domain of a multi-valued attribute isRead the answer and worked solution →Why are keys NOT decided by inspecting the data alone?Read the answer and worked solution →A ternary relationship has degreeRead the answer and worked solution →Students enrolling in courses is typically modelled with which cardinality ratio?Read the answer and worked solution →Role names in an ER diagram are essential forRead the answer and worked solution →If `A → B` holds in a relation, augmentation lets you also concludeRead the answer and worked solution →First Normal Form requires thatRead the answer and worked solution →A relation is in 2NF if it is in 1NF ANDRead the answer and worked solution →Without an ORDER BY clause, the order of rows returned by a SELECT isRead the answer and worked solution →In `ORDER BY age ASC, name DESC`, how are rows ordered when two students share the same age?Read the answer and worked solution →In a 100-row `employees` table where 20 rows have `salary` NULL,Read the answer and worked solution →A correlated subquery differs from an uncorrelated one in thatRead the answer and worked solution →Plain (non-materialized) SQL viewsRead the answer and worked solution →Per the SQL standard, `column IN (subquery)` is equivalent toRead the answer and worked solution →A power cut interrupts a bank transfer after the debit but before the credit. Which ACID property ensures the debit is undone too?Read the answer and worked solution →Two cashiers run two transfers concurrently on overlapping accounts. The ACID property that hides this concurrency from each cashier isRead the answer and worked solution →Two operations from different transactions conflict ifRead the answer and worked solution →A concurrent schedule is called serializable ifRead the answer and worked solution →Two schedules are conflict equivalent whenRead the answer and worked solution →A schedule S is conflict serializable if and only if its precedence graph isRead the answer and worked solution →If a precedence graph for a schedule is acyclic, thenRead the answer and worked solution →

Worked practice questions

Using the library analogy, what does the DBMS correspond to?

  1. the bookshelf where books physically sit
  2. the librarian who fetches and re-shelves books
  3. the actual library building structure
  4. the catalogue card index system
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Correct answer: B. the librarian who fetches and re-shelves books

The DBMS is the software that *manages* the data, the way a librarian manages the books on the shelves. The shelves, the building and the catalogue are all pieces of the library the librarian is the one actively running it. CMU's Lecture 01 makes the same point in plain English: the database is the data, the DBMS is the software.

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A schema is best described, in the menu analogy, as

  1. tonight's special dish on the chalkboard
  2. the price the customer paid at the counter
  3. the shape every dish must fit (main course = name + price)
  4. the eviction policy the kitchen uses for stale dishes
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Correct answer: C. the shape every dish must fit (main course = name + price)

The menu lists what is allowed, not what is being served right now. A schema is an agreement on shape (what columns exist and of what type), not the actual rows. Tonight's special is data, not schema the price paid is a row value eviction policy belongs to the buffer pool, not the schema.

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Per the kitchen-brigade analogy, the relational model's three pillars are

  1. select, project, join
  2. schemas, tables, indexes
  3. buffer pool, log, lock manager
  4. structure, integrity, manipulation
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Correct answer: D. structure, integrity, manipulation

CMU's Lecture 01 names exactly these three: structure (what relations exist and their attributes), integrity (rules the data must satisfy), manipulation (how to read and modify). The other options are real DBMS concepts but not the model's defining pillars.

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