To make it clear, this is not a how-to data modeling book. It is a book of universal data models. If you need to learn how to model, purchase another book; however I would certainly recommend this book in addition to your how-to book.
Where people or organizations generally run into trouble with universal data models is when egos, not invented here syndrome, or outright pride are allowed to play a major part.
I see these universal data models analogous to the use of prehung doors and pre-assembled windows. No builder in their right mind would allow their carpenters to use their valuable time building door and window assemblies. Why would an IS manager allow his data administrators, database administrators, or developers spend their valuable time reinventing the wheel with many of these relational structures? Universal Data Models are a tremendous time saver and will allow an IS organization to develop databases faster, better, and cheaper.
I attended a conference in April 2003 and saw a presentation by a consultant, who used these Universal Data Models to create a database for Authentication and Authorization. This is another example of the powerful benefit of these models.
We have used these models on several projects with great success and will continue to use them on our upcoming projects.
This book is basically rather simple to use; you find the data or subject of interest and then check to see if there are any attributes or relationships in the book that are relevant to your specific application database. This type of a check helps add quality and completeness to your logical and physical model.
But using the book just scratches the surface of its value; it's the author who's responsible for its quality and completeness. I've personally worked with Mr. Silverston who participated in consulting engagements at our firm and I've also seen him perform in the classroom setting. He seems to have an uncanny ability to analyze a given business situation-no matter how seemingly bizarre-and to create a model structure that will accommodate any situation.
I highly recommend the Resource Book to business analysts, application developers, programmers, and data warehouse designers.
Ted Kowalski Data Architect, Equilon Enterprises, Houston and author of "Opening Doors--A Facilitator's Handbook."
I have found that the models provided are very relevant, re-usable, and of very high quality. They also provide all the details necessary to create physical database designs. They include entities, keys (primary and foreign), relationships (named), attributes, and the appendices include a complete listing and cross referencing of the entities and attributes, which entities are used in which diagrams (in volume 2), and domains that specify the data type and suggested lengths for each attribute. The book provides clear explanations as to why the models are modeled a certain way as well as includes data examples showing the specific instances of data that could be stored in these models.
The data models offered are at what I would consider a mid level of abstraction. Therefore, they offer a good level of flexibility without being overly abstract. The author will use very useful abstractions such as a "party", "product", "agreement" and "work effort" (with many specific subtypes of these entities as they apply to the various industries) but he does not go overboard by including overly generic concepts like "item" "activity", or "thing" entities. What I really like is that the author will often show multiple ways of modeling the same construct and show the pros and cons of the different ways to model a construct. Sometimes specific data modeling constructs are shown and sometimes more abstract entity models are shown.
Both the volume 1 common models and volume 2 industry models have not only saved me time by being able to re-use the constructs, but they have offered some perspectives that did not occur to me and have literally been a life saver to me on many a project. I could not ask for a better reference on data modeling templates and re-usable data modeling examples!