Data base design is currently a costly and time consuming activity. Part of this overall design is concerned with the logic of the underlying network structure, and this part is commonly called logical design. Logical design involves a tedium of calculations which can be automated on a program and used as a design tool. The basic approach is applicable to a wide variety of data base handlers, such as IMS, the DBTC proposal, CIS, and others. The approach has been prototyped and a version suitable for IMS is now being used (DBDA) as a program product.   This paper describes the basic concepts and how they can be applied to IMS, DBTG or relational implementations. The data structure needed to support a particular application program is called the local view, and input to the design tool is the collection of all local views. Local views are constructedusing certain primitives which the integration of the local views.   The diagnostics of the design tool program will partially depend on the data base handler. Each handler, (IMS, DBTG., etc.) has different network restrictions which limit the local views which can be generated from the network. Different network restrictions result in different diagnostics. There is no relational data base handler to evaluate for network restrictions.
['George U. Hubbard', 'N. Raver']
Automating logical file design