A Methodology for Very Small Data Base Design ⋆ C. Bolchini * F. A. Schreiber L. Tanca Politecnico di Milano, Dipartimento di Elettronica e Informazione P.zza L. Da Vinci, 32 - 20133 Milano - Italy Abstract This paper proposes a design methodology for very small databases aimed at be- ing hosted by portable devices. Three main differences w.r.t. the traditional design methodologies are introduced: first, the main mobility issues are considered along with data distribution; second, context awareness is included in the data design issues to allow a full exploitation of context sensitive application functionalities; third, the peculiarities of the storage device(s) are taken into account by introduc- inga logistic phase after the usual conceptual and logical phases. The three aspects together determine the VSDB ambient which is the set of personal and environ- mental characteristics determining the portion of data that must be stored on the portabledevice.Thispaperdetailsthedesignmethodologyinitsconceptual,logical and logistic phases. Key words: Very Small Data Base, DB Design Methodology, Portable Devices 1 Introduction The use of handheld devices, such as Smart Cards, Portable Data Assistants (PDA), Palm PCs and Cell Phones, to store data locally and to issue transac- tions against both local and remote data from Information Systems is being widely discussed in recent times [1,4,5,6,7]. Features required by portable de- vices in order to manage data are, for some aspects, similar to those found ⋆ The work has been partially supported by the FIRB project MAIS * Corresponding author. Tel. +39 0223993619, Fax +39 0223993410 Email addresses: bolchini@elet.polimi.it (C. Bolchini), schreibe@elet.polimi.it (F. A. Schreiber), tanca@elet.polimi.it (L. Tanca). Preprint submitted to Information Systems 29th October 2004 Figure1r