Raymond F. Boyce
{{Short description|American computer scientist (1946–1974)}}
{{More footnotes|date=March 2016}}
{{Infobox scientist
| name = Ray Boyce
| image = Raymond F Boyce age 25.png
| caption =
| birth_date = {{Birth date|1946|8|27}}
| birth_place = New York City, US
| death_date = {{death date and age|1974|6|18|1946|8|27}}
| death_place = Santa Clara, California, US
| citizenship =
| nationality =
| field = Computer Science
| work_institution = IBM
| alma_mater =
| doctoral_advisor =
| doctoral_students =
| known_for = {{Unbulleted list|Relational model|SQL|Boyce–Codd normal form}}
| prizes =
| footnotes =
}}
Raymond Francis Boyce (August 27, 1946 – June 18, 1974){{Cite web |title=Raymond F Boyce in the California, U.S., Death Index, 1940-1997 (cited by Ancestry.com) |url=https://www.ancestry.com/search/collections/5180/records/768028 |access-date=December 24, 2024 |website=ancestry.com}} was an American computer scientist known for his research in relational databases. He is best known for his work co-developing the SQL database language and the Boyce-Codd normal form.
Biography
Boyce was born in New York City on August 27, 1946. He attended Providence College,{{cite news|url=https://digitalcommons.providence.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?referer=https://www.google.com/&httpsredir=1&article=1024&context=cowl|title=Dean's List Released For Past Semester|periodical=The Cowl|publisher=Providence College|date=September 27, 1967}} from which he graduated in 1968. He earned his PhD in computer science at Purdue in 1972. His wife was a nurse named Doris Ann{{Cite web |date=1974-06-21 |title=Raymond F. Boyce Obituary |url=https://www.ancestry.com/search/collections/61843/records/548758860 |access-date=2024-12-24 |website=The Journal News, White Plains, New York (via ancestry.com)}} (whence her nickname 'Sanndy'),{{cite interview |last=Chamberlin |first=Donald |subject-link=Donald D. Chamberlin |interviewer=Paul McJones |title=Chamberlin, Donald oral history |work=Oral history collection |date=July 21, 2009 |publisher=Computer History Museum |location=Mountain View, California |url=https://archive.computerhistory.org/resources/access/text/2015/06/102702111-05-01-acc.pdf |page=19 }} whom he had met in college. After leaving Purdue, he worked on database projects for IBM in Yorktown Heights, New York. In the short period that he had, which was not quite two years long, he co-developed Boyce–Codd normal form. Together with Donald D. Chamberlin, he co-developed Structured Query Language (SQL) while managing the Relation Database development group for IBM in San Jose, California. He died on June 18, 1974, as a result of an aneurysm, leaving behind his wife Sanndy and his infant daughter Kristin.
SQL
SQL was initially co-developed at IBM by Boyce alongside Donald D. Chamberlin in the early 1970s. Initially called SEQUEL (Structured English Query Language) and based on their original language called SQUARE (Specifying Queries As Relational Expressions). SEQUEL was designed to manipulate and retrieve data in relational databases. By 1974, Chamberlin and Boyce published “SEQUEL: A Structured English Query Language” which detailed their refinements to SQUARE and introduced us to the data retrieval aspects of SEQUEL.{{cite web |url=http://ccollins.wordpress.com/2007/05/20/history-of-sql/ |author=Chris Collins |date=20 May 2007 |title=History of SQL |work=blog }} It was one of the first languages to use Edgar F. Codd's relational model. SEQUEL was later renamed to SQL by dropping the vowels, because SEQUEL was a trade mark registered by the Hawker Siddeley aircraft company. Today, SQL has become the most widely used relational database language.
Boyce-Codd normal form
Boyce–Codd normal form (BCNF) was developed in 1974 by Boyce and Edgar F. Codd. It is a type of normal form that is used in database normalization. The goal of relational database design is to generate a set of database schemas that store information without unnecessary redundancy. Boyce-Codd accomplishes this and allows users to retrieve information easily. Using BCNF, databases will have all redundancy removed based on functional dependencies. It is a slightly stronger version of the third normal form.
References
Further reading
{{Refbegin}}
- [http://www.mcjones.org/System_R/SQL_Reunion_95/ The 1995 SQL Reunion: People, Projects, and Politics (early history of SQL)]
- [http://www.almaden.ibm.com/cs/people/chamberlin/sequel-1974.pdf “SEQUEL: A Structured English Query Language”] D.D. Chamberlin and R.F. Boyce, Proc. ACM SIGMOD Workshop on Data Description, Access and Control, Ann Arbor, Michigan (May 1974) pages 249-264.
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Boyce, Raymond F.}}