Entity Relationship Diagram Exercises

For each of the following narratives, draw an ERD diagram which

indicates the entities and their attributes (if noted). Identify and label
significant relationships between pairs of entities.

Exercise 1

Create a Crow’s Foot ERD for each of the following descriptions. (Note

that the word "many" is meant to mean "more than one" in a database
modelling environment.)

a) Each of the MegaCo Corporation’s divisions is composed of many

departments. Each of the departments has many employees assigned to
it, but each employee works for only one department. Each department
is managed by one employee, and each of these managers can manage
only one department at a time.

b) During some period of time, a customer can rent many videotapes

from the BigVid store. Each of the BigVid’s videotapes can be rented to
many customers during that period of time.

c) An airline can be assigned to fly many flights, but each flight is flown
by only one airline .

d) The KwikTite Corporation operates many factories. Each factory is

located in a region. Each region can be "home" to many of KwikTite’s
factories. Each factory employs many employees, but each of these
employees is employed by only one factory. 

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e) An employee may have earned many degrees, and each degree may
have been earned by many employees.

Exercise 2

Pick and Shovel Construction Company is a multi-state building

contractor specializing in medium-priced town homes. Assume that Pick
and Shovel’s main entities are its customers, employees, projects and
equipment. A customer can hire the company for more than one
project, and employees sometimes work on more than one project at a
time. Equipment, however, is assigned to only one project at a time.
Draw an ERD showing those entities. 

Exercise 3

FastFlight Airlines is a small air carrier operating in three north-

eastern states. FastFlight is in the process of computerizing its passenger
reservation system. The following data items have been identified:
reservation code, flight number, flight date, origin, destination,
departure time, arrival time, passenger name, seat number, reservation
agent number and reservation agent name. For example, flight number
303, which is scheduled every Tuesday and Thursday, leaves Augusta,
Maine, at 9:23am and arrives in Nashua, New Hampshire at 10:17am.
You can assume that the Fast Freight reservation system will detect
automatically whether empty seats are available. Draw the Entity
Relationship Diagram for this system.

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Exercise 4

Prepare an Entity Relationship Diagram for Patty’s Daycare Centre. For

each entity indicate the primary key by underlining attribute(s) making up
primary key and also specify 1 additional significant attribute. Identify and
label significant relationships between pairs of entities (either 1:1, 1 : M or
M:N).

Patty’s Playschool is a child daycare centre. A parent registers their

child or children at the school using a registration form. A parent can
submit more than one registration form. Each room in the daycare is
assigned an age group. For example an infant is under 1 yearof age and
toddlers are from 1 to 3 years of age. A child is assigned to a room based
on their age and availability of space. A room may be assigned one or
more employees. An employee can only be assigned to one room. The
minimum number of employees required for a room is determined by
the number of children assigned to the room and the child:staff ratio
identified by the government. For example one employee can care for 5
infants or 8 toddlers.
 
 

More exercises:

1. A large bank operates several divisions. Information Technology (IT)

is operated as one of these divisions. Within the IT division are many
departments that are managed by one manager, and all IT employees
belong to one of these departments.

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The IT division assigns it's employees to one or more on going projects
in the bank. A project may be planned, but not have any employees
assigned to it for several months. Each project will have a single
employee assigned who acts as a project leader.
 
 
 
 

2. A hardware store sells several home workshop products to the public

(such as power saws and sanders). Each product has several different
manufacturers who manufacture it, and prices are different for
products made by different manufacurers. Each time one or more
products are sold to a customer, an invoice is created which lists the
date, items purchased and their prices, and then the total purchase and
tax amounts.
 
  3. The Ministry of Transportation (MOT) supplies department keeps
track of all the items (furniture and equipment such as a chair or
printer) in the Ministry offices. There are several MOT buildings and
each one is given a different name to identify it. Each item is assigned a
unique ID when it is purchased. This ID is used to keep track of the
item, which is assigned to a room within a building. Each room within a
building is assigned to a department, and each department has a single
employee as it's manager.
 
 

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4. A cooking club organizes several dinners for it's members. The
purpose of the club is to allow several members to get together and
prepare a dinner for the other members. The club president maintains a
database that plans each meal and tracks which members attends each
dinner, and also keeps track of which members creates each dinner.

Each dinner serves many members and any member is allowed to

attend. Each dinner has an invitation. This invitation is mailed to each
member. The invitation includes the date of the dinner and location.

Each dinner is based on a single entrée and a single dessert. This entrée
and dessert can be used again for other dinners.
   
 

5. ABC Consulting is a small-sized consulting firm in the IT industry.

ABC’s business is managing several Systems Development projects by
assigning staff consultants to these projects as their skills are needed.
Each employee is designated to have one primary skill, but there may be
other employees with the same primary skill. A consultant may work on
one or more projects, or may not yet be assigned to a project.
 
 

The company charges for each project by billing each consultant's

hours worked by the billing rate. The hourly billing rate is dependant
on the employee’s primary job skill.
 

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6. A company purchases products and sells them to it's customers. Each

time a sale occurs, an invoice is created listing the customer name, and a
list of purchase product descriptions, the supplier name for the
products, and the price of each product. The product number identifies
each product and will appear again if another customer purchases the
same product. Each supplier can supply many products which we can
sell, but each product has only one supplier.
 
 
 
 

7. You are asked to create a database to produce a report of customer

details. The report is to list the cutomer name, account balance, credit
limit, and other customer details. The report will also list the customer
account rep (one of our sales employees). Our sales reps manage many
customers each, but each customer will be managed by only one account
rep at any one time. However, your design should allow for customer's
being managed by many account reps as it is possible that some of our
employees may leave the company - thus, requiring new account reps
for a customer.
 
 

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8. A company operates a warehouse parts supply business. The

company has several warehouses located in Toronto which each store
several hundreds of automotive parts. We need to keep a record of how
many parts are "on hand" - meaning inventory levels that tell us how
many we have for each part. To help us organize our parts, each part is
assigned a specific classification. There are 4 classifications that we use
to organize hundreds of parts.
 
 
 
 

9. To keep track of office furniture, computers, printers, and so on, the

FOUNDIT company requires the creation of a simple database. Each
piece of office furniture, computer or printer is given an identification
number. Each item is then placed in a room of one of three buildings.
The building manager is responsible for the items in their building.