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A Micro Project On

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33 views3 pages

A Micro Project On

Uploaded by

jitupaw2334
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© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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A MICRO PROJECT ON "E-R diagram"

1.0 Brief Introduction/Rationale


An Entity–relationship model (ER model) defines the structure of a database with the
aid of a diagram, which is known as an Entity Relationship Diagram (ER Diagram).
An ER model is a design or blueprint of a database that can later be executed as a
database. The major components of the E-R model are the entity set and relationship
set.

What is an Entity Relationship Diagram (ER Diagram)?

An ER diagram displays the relationship among entity sets. An entity set is a group of
identical entities and these entities can have attributes. In terms of DBMS, an entity is a
table or attribute of a table in the database, so by showing the relationship among tables
and their attributes, ER diagram illustrates the complete logical structure of a database.
Let's have a look at a simple ER diagram to comprehend this concept.

A simple ER Diagram:

In the following diagram, we have two entities Student and College, and their
relationship. The relationship between Student and College is many to one as a college
can have numerous students however a student cannot study in numerous colleges at
the same time. Student entity has attributes such as Stu_Id, Stu_Name & Stu_Addr and
College entity has attributes such as Col_ID .
Here are the geometric shapes and their significance in an E-R Diagram.

Rectangle: Describes Entity sets.


Ellipses: Attributes
Diamonds: Relationship Set
Lines: They link attributes to Entity Sets and Entity sets to Relationship Set
Double Ellipses: Multivalued Attributes
Dashed Ellipses: Derived Attributes
Double Rectangles: Weak Entity Sets
Double Lines: Total participation of an entity in a relationship set

Elements of an ER Diagram

As displayed in the above diagram, an ER diagram has three major components:


1. Entity
2. Attribute
3. Relationship
1. Entity

An entity is an object or element of data. An entity is described as a rectangle in an ER


diagram.
For example: In the following ER diagram we have two entities Student and College and
these two entities have many to one relationship as many students study in a single
college. We will read more about relationships later, but for now, concentrate on
entities.

 Weak Entity:

An entity that cannot be uniquely determined by its own attributes and relies on the
relationship with another entity is called a weak entity. The weak entity is defined by a
double rectangle. For example – a bank account cannot be uniquely determined without
knowing the bank to which the account belongs, so bank account is a weak entity.

2. Attribute

An attribute defines the property of an entity. An attribute is expressed as an Oval in an


ER diagram. There are four kinds of attributes:
1. Key attribute
2. Composite attribute
3. Multivalued attribute
4. Derived attribute

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