Entity-

Relationship
Model
ER Model
● Data Model is the modeling of the data description, data semantics, and consistency constraints of the data.

● ER Model
○ It is a high level data model based on a perception of a real world that consists of a collection of basic objects,
called entities and of relationships among these objects.
○ Graphical representation of ER Model is ER diagram, which acts as a blueprint of DB.
Entity
● An Entity is a “thing” or “object” in the real world that is distinguishable from all
other objects.
● It has physical existence.
○ Each student in a college is an entity.
● Entity can be uniquely identified. (By a primary attribute, aka Primary Key)
● Strong Entity: Can be uniquely identified.
● Weak Entity: Can’t be uniquely identified., depends on some other strong
entity.
○ It does not have sufficient attributes to select a uniquely identifiable attribute
○ Employee-> Strong Entity, Dependent-> Weak Entity
○ Weak Entity depends on Strong Entity for existence.
Entity Set
● It is a set of entities of the same type that share the same properties, or
attributes.
● E.g.,
○ Student is an entity set.
○ Customer of a bank
Attributes
● An entity is represented by a set of attributes.
● Each entity has a value for each of its attributes.
● For each attribute, there is a set of permitted values, called the domain, or value
set, of that attribute.
● E.g., Student Entity has following attributes
○ Student_ID
○ Name
○ Standard
○ Course
○ Batch
○ Contact number
○ Address
Types of Attributes
● Simple: Attributes which can’t be divided further.
○ E.g., Customer’s account number in a bank, Student’s Roll number etc.
● Composite: Can be divided into subparts (that is, other attributes).
○ E.g., Name of a person, can be divided into first-name, middle-name, last-name.
○ If user wants to refer to an entire attribute or to only a component of the attribute.
○ Address can also be divided, street, city, state, PIN code.
● Single-valued: Only one value attribute.
○ e.g., Student ID, loan-number for a loan.
● Multi-valued: Attribute having more than one value.
○ e.g., phone-number, nominee-name on some insurance, dependent-name etc.
○ Limit constraint may be applied, upper or lower limits.
● Derived: Value of this type of attribute can be derived from the value of other related attributes.
○ e.g., Age, loan-age, membership-period etc.

NULL Value: An attribute takes a null value when an entity does not have a value for it.
○ It may indicate “not applicable”, value doesn’t exist. e.g., person having no middle-name
○ It may indicate “unknown”.
○ Unknown can indicate missing entry, e.g., name value of a customer is NULL, means it is missing as name must have some
value.
○ Not known, salary attribute value of an employee is null, means it is not known yet.
Types of Attributes
Relationship
● Association among two or more entities.
○ e.g., Person has vehicle, Parent has Child, Customer borrow loan etc.
● Strong Relationship, between two independent entities.
● Weak Relationship, between weak entity and its owner/strong entity.
● Degree of Relationship
○ Unary: Only one entity participates. e.g., Employee manages employee.
○ Binary: two entities participates. e.g., Student takes Course.
○ Ternary: three entities participates. E.g, Employee works-on branch, employee works-on job.
Symbols used in ER Diagram
Relationship Constraints
1. Mapping Cardinality / Cardinality Ratio
● Number of entities to which another entity can be associated via a relationship.
● One to one, Entity in A associates with at most one entity in B, where A & B are entity
sets. And an entity of B is associated with at most one entity of A.
○ E.g., Citizen has Aadhar Card.
● One to many, Entity in A associated with N entity in B. While entity in B is associated
with at most one entity in A.
○ E.g., Citizen has Vehicle.
● Many to one, Entity in A associated with at most one entity in B. While entity in B can
be associated with N entity in A.
○ E.g., Course taken by Professor.
● Many to many, Entity in A associated with N entity in B. While entity in B also
associated with N entity in A.
○ E.g., Student attend course.
Relationship Constraints
2. Participation Constraints

● Aka, Minimum cardinality constraint.

● Types, Partial & Total Participation.
● Partial Participation, not all entities are involved in the relationship instance.
● Total Participation, each entity must be involved in at least one relationship
instance.
● e.g., Customer borrow loan, loan has total participation as it can’t exist without
customer entity. And Customer has partial participation.
● Weak entity has total participation constraint, but strong may not have total.
Practice Questions

•A university consists of a number of departments. Each department

offers several courses. A number of modules make up each course.
Students enrol in a particular course and take modules towards the
completion of that course. Each module is taught by a lecturer from
the appropriate department, and each lecturer tutors a group of
students