Bernhard Thalheim


Bernhard Karl Thalheim is a German computer scientist and Professor of Information Systems Engineering at the University of Kiel who is known for conceptual modeling and its theoretical foundational contributions.

Biography

Born in Radebeul near Dresden, Germany, Thalheim received his M.Sc. in Mathematics and Computer science in 1975 at the Dresden University of Technology, his PhD in Discrete mathematics in 1979 at the Lomonosov Moscow State University, and his Habilitation in Theoretical computer science in 1985 at the Dresden University of Technology.
From 1986 to 1989 Thalheim was an Associate Professor at the Dresden University of Technology. In 1989 he moved to the University of Rostock, where he was Professor until 1993. From 1993 to 2003 he was Dean and Full Professor at the Brandenburg Technical University, and since 2003 he is Professor at the Christian-Albrechts-Universität of Kiel. Thalheim has been Visiting Professor at the Kuwait University; at the University of Klagenfurt, Austria; at the Alfréd Rényi Institute of Mathematics, Hungarian Academy of Sciences; and at Massey University at Palmerston North, New Zealand.
Thalheim has received a number of awards for his achievements in information systems engineering. He was honored in 2005 as the Kolmogorov Professor h.c. at the Lomonosov Moscow State University, on 22. 10. 2008 received the Peter P. Chen Award of Elsevier for Entity–relationship model research, is the founder of the German Chapter of DAMA, international Vice-Chair of the steering committee of the FoIKS conferences, Member of steering committees of conferences, e.g. ER, ADBIS, ASM, NLDB Editor of Data and Knowledge Engineering and other journals, and member of the advisory board of Dataport.

Work

Conceptual modeling

The foundational contributions to conceptual modeling theory and Science of Conceptual Modeling of Thalheim can be found at multiple levels and abstractions, such as:
With this work Thalheim contributed to the formalization and theoretical underpinning of conceptual modeling.
His ideas about conceptual modeling foundations and theory have been applied in field as:
The Higher Order Extended Entity–relationship model and dependencies in relational databases serve as the foundation of many systems analysis and design methodologies, computer-aided software engineering tools, and repository systems. The HERM Model is the basis for wide number of commercial projects in Germany and Europe, and is commonly cited as the definite reference for foundations of database management systems and entity–relationship modeling. The approach has been ranked as one of the top methodologies for database design and systems development by several surveys of high-profile companies.
A web information system is an information system that can be accessed through the world – wide – web. On a high level of abstraction a WIS can be described by a storyboard which in an abstract way specific who will be using the system, in which way and for which goals.

Other developments

Bernhard Thalheim published several books, papers and articles.

Selected books