Chapter 9
Dealing with Data Models
IN THIS CHAPTER
Getting up to speed on Data Models
Creating relationships between tables
Managing a Data Model using Power Pivot
Using Power Pivot to create a PivotTable or PivotChart
If you hang out in online places where folks talk about Excel (hey, it could happen), someone at some point will describe Excel as a “very good flat-file database management system” (or something along those lines). The operative adjectival phrase here is flat-file, which describes a database in which all data is stored in standalone tables that have no relationship with each other. The opposite is a relational database management system in which the tables are (or, at least, can be) related in some way. (You learn what these types of relationships are all about in this chapter.) Standalone tables are merely two-dimensional (hence flat), while adding a relational angle gives the data a third dimension.
At first glance, it seems as though that online opiner was right: Excel workbooks generally consist of multiple, standalone tables, so Excel really is a flat-file database. ...
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