Lecture # 3 Data Modeling Using

Entity Relationship (ER) Model

Rashmi Dutta Baruah

Department of Computer Science & Engineering
 Outline

• Data Models for database design

• Entity – Relationship model

2
Figure: Main phases of database design
3
 Example COMPANY Database
• Requirements of the Company (oversimplified for
illustrative purposes)
– The company is organized into DEPARTMENTs. Each
department has a name, number and an employee who
manages the department. We keep track of the start
date of the department manager.
– Each department controls a number of PROJECTs. Each
project has a name, number and is located at a single
location.

4
 Example COMPANY Database (Cont.)

• We store each EMPLOYEE’s social security number, address,

salary, sex, and birthdate. Each employee works for one
department but may work on several projects. We keep track
of the number of hours per week that an employee currently
works on each project. We also keep track of the direct
supervisor of each employee.

• Each employee may have a number of DEPENDENTs. For each

dependent, we keep track of their name, sex, birthdate, and
relationship to employee.

5
 ER DIAGRAM – Entity Types are:
EMPLOYEE, DEPARTMENT, PROJECT, DEPENDENT

6
 ER Model Concepts
• Entities and Attributes
– Entities are specific objects or things in the mini-world that
are represented in the database. For example the EMPLOYEE
John Smith, the Research DEPARTMENT, the ProductX PROJECT
– Attributes are properties used to describe an entity. For
example an EMPLOYEE entity may have a Name, SSN, Address,
Sex, BirthDate
– A specific entity will have a value for each of its attributes.
For example a specific employee entity may have Name='John
Smith', SSN='123456789', Address ='731, Fondren, Houston,
TX', Sex='M', BirthDate='09-JAN-55‘
– Each attribute has a value set (or data type) associated with it
– e.g. integer, string, subrange, enumerated type, …

7
 Types of Attributes (1)
• Simple
– Each entity has a single atomic value for the attribute. For
example, SSN or Sex.
• Composite
– The attribute may be composed of several components. For
example, Address (Apt#, House#, Street, City, State, ZipCode,
Country) or Name (FirstName, MiddleName, LastName).
Composition may form a hierarchy where some components are
themselves composite.
• Multi-valued
– An entity may have multiple values for that attribute. For
example, Color of a CAR or PreviousDegrees of a STUDENT.
Denoted as {Color} or {PreviousDegrees}.

8
 Types of Attributes (2)
• Stored vs. Derived attributes – two or more attribute values
can be related – example Age and DoB where Age is derived
attribute and is derivable from DoB which is stored attribute.

• Composite attribute- In general, composite and multi-valued

attributes may be nested arbitrarily to any number of levels
although this is rare. For example, PreviousDegrees of a
STUDENT is a composite multi-valued attribute denoted by
{PreviousDegrees (College, Year, Degree, Field)}.

9
 Entity Types and Key Attributes
• Entities with the same basic attributes are grouped or typed into
an entity type. For example, the EMPLOYEE entity type or the
PROJECT entity type.

• An attribute of an entity type for which each entity must have a

unique value is called a key attribute of the entity type. For
example, SSN of EMPLOYEE.

• A key attribute may be composite. For example,

VehicleTagNumber is a key of the CAR entity type with
components (Number, State).

• An entity type may have more than one key. For example, the CAR
entity type may have two keys:
– VehicleIdentificationNumber (popularly called VIN) and
– VehicleTagNumber (Number, State), also known as license_plate number.

10
 ENTITY SET corresponding to the
ENTITY TYPE CAR
CAR
Registration(RegistrationNumber, State), VehicleID, Make, Model, Year, (Color)

car1
((ABC 123, TEXAS), TK629, Ford Mustang, convertible, 1999, (red, black))
car2
((ABC 123, NEW YORK), WP9872, Nissan 300ZX, 2-door, 2002, (blue))
car3
((VSY 720, TEXAS), TD729, Buick LeSabre, 4-door, 2003, (white, blue))
.
.
.
 SUMMARY OF ER-DIAGRAM
NOTATION FOR ER SCHEMAS Meaning
Symbol

ENTITY TYPE

WEAK ENTITY TYPE

RELATIONSHIP TYPE

IDENTIFYING RELATIONSHIP TYPE

ATTRIBUTE

KEY ATTRIBUTE

MULTIVALUED ATTRIBUTE

COMPOSITE ATTRIBUTE

DERIVED ATTRIBUTE

E1 R E2 TOTAL PARTICIPATION OF E2 IN R

N CARDINALITY RATIO 1:N FOR E1:E2 IN R

E1 R E2

(min,max) STRUCTURAL CONSTRAINT (min, max) ON PARTICIPATION OF E IN R

R E
12
Initial Conceptual Design of
COMPANY database

13
Relationships and Relationship Types (1)
• A relationship relates two or more distinct entities with a
specific meaning. For example, EMPLOYEE John Smith works
on the ProductX PROJECT or EMPLOYEE Franklin Wong
manages the Research DEPARTMENT.

• Relationships of the same type are grouped or typed into a

relationship type. For example, the WORKS_ON relationship
type in which EMPLOYEEs and PROJECTs participate, or the
MANAGES relationship type in which EMPLOYEEs and
DEPARTMENTs participate.

• The degree of a relationship type is the number of

participating entity types. Both MANAGES and WORKS_ON
are binary relationships.

Chapter 3-14
Example relationship instances of the WORKS_FOR relationship
between EMPLOYEE and DEPARTMENT
EMPLOYEE WORKS_FOR DEPARTMENT

e1 r1 d1
e2
r2
e3 d2
r3
e4
e5 r4 d3

e6 r5

e7 r6

r7

15
Relationships and Relationship Types (2)
• More than one relationship type can exist with the same
participating entity types. For example, MANAGES and
WORKS_FOR are distinct relationships between EMPLOYEE
and DEPARTMENT, but with different meanings and different
relationship instances.

16
 ER DIAGRAM – Relationship Types are:
WORKS_FOR, MANAGES, WORKS_ON, CONTROLS,
SUPERVISION, DEPENDENTS_OF

Chapter 3-17
 Weak Entity Types

• An entity that does not have a key attribute

• A weak entity must participate in an identifying relationship
type with an owner or identifying entity type
• Entities are identified by the combination of:
– A partial key of the weak entity type
– The particular entity they are related to in the identifying
entity type
Example:
Suppose that a DEPENDENT entity is identified by the dependent’s
first name and birhtdate, and the specific EMPLOYEE that the
dependent is related to. DEPENDENT is a weak entity type with
EMPLOYEE as its identifying entity type via the identifying
relationship type DEPENDENT_OF

Chapter 3-18
 Weak Entity Type is: DEPENDENT
Identifying Relationship is: DEPENDENTS_OF

Chapter 3-19
 Constraints on Relationships
• Constraints on Relationship Types
– ( Also known as ratio constraints )
– Maximum Cardinality
• One-to-one (1:1)
• One-to-many (1:N) or Many-to-one (N:1)
• Many-to-many
– Minimum Cardinality (also called participation
constraint or existence dependency constraints)
• zero (optional participation, not existence-dependent)
• one or more (mandatory, existence-dependent)

Chapter 3-20
 Many-to-one (N:1) RELATIONSHIP
EMPLOYEE WORKS_FOR DEPARTMENT

e1 r1 d1
e2
r2
e3 d2
r3
e4
r4 d3
e5
e6 r5

e7 r6

r7

Chapter 3-21
 Many-to-many (M:N) RELATIONSHIP
EMPLOYEE WORKS_ON PROJECT

r9

e1 r1 p1
e2
r2
e3 p2
r3
e4
r4 p3
e5
e6 r5

e7 r6

r8 r7

Chapter 3-22
Relationships and Relationship Types (3)
• We can also have a recursive relationship type.
• Both participations are same entity type in different roles.
• For example, SUPERVISION relationships between EMPLOYEE
(in role of supervisor or boss) and (another) EMPLOYEE (in
role of subordinate or worker).
• In following figure, first role participation labeled with 1 and
second role participation labeled with 2.
• In ER diagram, need to display role names to distinguish
participations.

Chapter 3-23
 A RECURSIVE RELATIONSHIP
SUPERVISION
EMPLOYEE SUPERVISION

e1 2
1 r1
e2 2
1 r2
e3 2
1 r3
e4
2
e5 1
1 r4
e6 2
1
r5
e7
2
r6

© The Benjamin/Cummings Publishing Company, Inc. 1994, Elmasri/Navathe, Fundamentals of Database Systems, Second Edition

Chapter 3-24
 Recursive Relationship Type is: SUPERVISION
(participation role names are shown)

Chapter 3-25
 Attributes of Relationship types

• A relationship type can have attributes; for example,

HoursPerWeek of WORKS_ON; its value for each
relationship instance describes the number of hours
per week that an EMPLOYEE works on a PROJECT.

Chapter 3-26
 Attribute of a Relationship Type is:
Hours of WORKS_ON

Chapter 3-27
 Structural Constraints –
one way to express semantics
of relationships
Structural constraints on relationships:
Cardinality ratio (of a binary relationship): 1:1, 1:N, N:1, or
M:N
SHOWN BY PLACING APPROPRIATE NUMBER ON THE LINK.
Participation constraint (on each participating entity
type): total (called existence dependency) or partial.
SHOWN BY DOUBLE LINING THE LINK
NOTE: These are easy to specify for Binary Relationship
Types.

Chapter 3-28
 Alternative (min, max) notation for relationship structural
constraints:
Specified on each participation of an entity type E in a relationship type R
Specifies that each entity e in E participates in at least min and at most max
relationship instances in R
Default(no constraint): min=0, max=n
Must have minmax, min0, max 1
Derived from the knowledge of mini-world constraints
Examples:
A department has exactly one manager and an employee can manage at
most one department.
– Specify (0,1) for participation of EMPLOYEE in MANAGES

– Specify (1,1) for participation of DEPARTMENT in MANAGES

An employee can work for exactly one department but a department can
have any number of employees.
– Specify (1,1) for participation of EMPLOYEE in WORKS_FOR

– Specify (0,n) for participation of DEPARTMENT in WORKS_FOR

Chapter 3-29
 The (min,max) notation
relationship constraints
(0,1) (1,1)
Employee Manages Department

(1,1) (1,N)
Department
Employee Works-for

Chapter 3-30
 COMPANY ER Schema Diagram
using (min, max) notation

Chapter 3-31
 Relationships of Higher Degree

Relationship types of degree 2 are called binary

Relationship types of degree 3 are called ternary and of
degree n are called n-ary
In general, an n-ary relationship is not equivalent to n
binary relationships
Higher-order relationships discussed further in Chapter 4

Chapter 3-32
 Data Modeling Tools
A number of popular tools that cover conceptual
modeling and mapping into relational schema
design. Examples: ERWin, S- Designer (Enterprise
Application Suite), ER- Studio, etc.
POSITIVES: serves as documentation of application
requirements, easy user interface - mostly graphics
editor support

Chapter 3-33
 Problems with Current Modeling Tools

• DIAGRAMMING
– Poor conceptual meaningful notation.
– To avoid the problem of layout algorithms and aesthetics of
diagrams, they prefer boxes and lines and do nothing more
than represent (primary-foreign key) relationships among
resulting tables.(a few exceptions)
• METHODOLGY
– lack of built-in methodology support.
– poor tradeoff analysis or user-driven design preferences.
– poor design verification and suggestions for improvement.

Chapter 3-34
 Some of the Currently Available Automated Database
Design Tools

COMPANY TOOL FUNCTIONALITY

Embarcadero ER Studio Database Modeling in ER and IDEF1X
Technologies
DB Artisan Database administration and space and security
management
Oracle Developer 2000 and Designer Database modeling, application development
2000
Popkin Software System Architect 2001 Data modeling, object modeling, process modeling,
structured analysis/design
Platinum Platinum Enterprice Data, process, and business component modeling
Technology Modeling Suite: Erwin,
BPWin, Paradigm Plus
Persistence Inc. Pwertier Mapping from O-O to relational model

Rational Rational Rose Modeling in UML and application generation in C++

and JAVA
Rogue Ware RW Metro Mapping from O-O to relational model

Resolution Ltd. Xcase Conceptual modeling up to code maintenance

Sybase Enterprise Application Suite Data modeling, business logic modeling
Visio Visio Enterprise Data modeling, design and reengineering Visual Basic
and Visual C++
 ER DIAGRAM FOR A BANK
DATABASE

© The Benjamin/Cummings Publishing Company, Inc. 1994, Elmasri/Navathe, Fundamentals of Database Systems, Second Edition

Chapter 3-36
 PROBLEM with ER notation

THE ENTITY RELATIONSHIP MODEL IN ITS ORIGINAL

FORM DID NOT SUPPORT THE SPECIALIZATION/
GENERALIZATION ABSTRACTIONS
• Extended Entity-Relationship (EER) Model
– Incorporates Set-subset relationships
– Incorporates Specialization/Generalization Hierarchies

Chapter 3-37
 Summary
• We discussed the modeling concepts of a high-level
conceptual data model, the E-R model.
• Defined basic ER model concepts of entities and their
attributes.
• Discussed NULL values and presented various types of
attributes which can be nested to get complex attributes:
– Simple or atomic
– Composite
– Multivalued
• Stored vs. derived attributes

38
 Summary (Contd.)
• We discussed the ER model concepts at he schema or
intension level
– Entity types and their corresponding entity sets
– Key attributes of entity types
– Value sets (domains) of attributes
– Relationship types and their corresponding relationship sets
– Participation roles of entity types in relationship types
• Two types of structural constraints:
– Cardinality ratios (1:1, 1:N, M:N for binary relationships)
– Participation constraints (total, partial)
• Weak entity types and related concepts
• Relationship types, binary, ternary and higher order
relationships

39