2021 EDSIG Proceedings: Abstract Presentation
Gold Rush Antiques: A Database Management Case
Renee Pratt
Auburn University
Cindi Smatt
University of North Georgia
Abstract
The growth of small businesses depends on the ability to track and manage information. A local antique shop in Atlanta, GA, has expanded into multiple locations across the region and needs a centralized information system. The owners of the antique shop have requested a sales management system (SMS) to manage products, sellers, booths, locations, and employees. Currently, their system uses hand-written price tags, a simple cash register transactional process, Excel spreadsheets, and data submitted via web forms. The antique store is a real-world example, developed for use in a database management course, that requires students to review the business case and interpret website information to design and develop an administrative access site. The focus of this project is on the dealer-sales relationship. The case introduces functional requirements for a database management system (DBMS) by emphasizing effective business rules and professional database development. In the classroom, instructors may apply this case study to any DBMS tool (MS Access, MySQL, etc.) and students are not required to have prior relational database experience. Students enhance their skillsets by working with entity-relationship diagrams (ERD), structured query language (SQL), the creation and development of forms, queries, and reports, and a dashboard to complete the functional requirements. Teaching notes including suggested guidelines, deliverables, and an example database containing sample data and a possible solution are provided upon request.
Keywords: database management system, DBMS, Microsoft Access, real-world case study, sales management system, database, structured query language