Database Design

9-3
Relationship Mapping

Copyright © 2015, Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved.

Objectives

This lesson covers the following objectives:

• Apply the rule of relationship mapping to correctly transform
1:M and barred relationships
• Apply the rule of relationship mapping to correctly transform
M:M relationships
• Transform 1:1 relationships
• Apply the rule of relationship mapping to correctly transform
relationships in an arc

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Relationship Mapping
Purpose

• Suppose that you are building a house for someone.

• You have all of the materials – wood, paint, doors, windows,
nails, screws, etc. – and the skills, but you do not have a
design.
• As you start, you don’t know how many rooms should be
included, where the windows should be placed, how the
doors should be oriented, or what color each room should be
painted.

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Relationship Mapping
Purpose

• You could build a house

in such a manner and
make these decisions as
you go, but if you do not
start with a blueprint of
the structural design,
the final product may
not be the house that
the customer has in
mind.

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Relationship Mapping
Purpose

• Relationships are mapped between primary keys and foreign

keys to allow one table to reference another.
• If we don’t map relationships, we just have a lot of
standalone tables containing information that does not
connect to anything else in the database.
• Mapping relationships between entities serves as a critical
“first-step” to facilitate discussion between the customer,
designer, developer, and administrator of the database
product.

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Relationship Mapping
Rules for Relationships

• A relationship creates one or more foreign-key columns in the

table on the many side of the relationship.
• We use the short name of the table to name the foreign-key
column.
• In the example on the next page, the foreign-key column in
the EMPLOYEES table is dpt_id for the relationship with
DEPARTMENT, and mgr_id for the recursive relationship with
itself.

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Relationship Mapping
Rules for Relationships

• The foreign-key column may be either mandatory or optional,

depending on the needs of the business.
• In the example, dpt_id is mandatory and mgr_id is optional.

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Relationship Mapping
Rules for Relationships Illustrated
managed by

EMPLOYEE DEPARTMENT
# id # id
belong to
the manager * name * name
of * address
* birth date composed of

EMPLOYEES (EPE)
DEPARTMENTS (DPT)
Key Type Optionality Column
Name Key Type Optionality Column
Name
pk * id
pk * id
* name
uk * name
* address
* birth_date
foreign key refers to
fk1 * dpt_id

fk2 o mgr_id
foreign key refers to

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Relationship Mapping
Mapping of Mandatory Relationship at the
One Side

• Relationships that are mandatory on the one side, or

mandatory on both sides, are mapped exactly the same way
as a relationship that is optional on the one side.
• The conceptual model is rich enough to capture optionality at
both ends of the relationship.
• However, the physical model is limited in that a foreign-key
constraint can enforce a mandatory relationship only at the
many end.

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Relationship Mapping
Mapping of Mandatory Relationship at the
One Side

• In the following example, the physical model cannot enforce

that a BAND must be composed of at least one MUSICIAN.
• The optionality at the one end will have to be implemented
through additional programming.

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Relationship Mapping
Enforcing Optionality
MUSICIAN BAND
# id a member of
# id
* name composed of * name
o instrument

MUSICIANS (MSN)
BANDS (BAD)
Key type Optionality Column
name Key type Optionality Column
pk * id foreign name
key
* name refers pk * id
to
o instrument * name

fk o bad_id

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Relationship Mapping
Mapping of Nontransferable Relationships

• A nontransferable relationship in the conceptual model

means that the foreign-key column in the database table
cannot be updated.
• The foreign-key constraint by itself cannot enforce this in the
database.
• Additional programming will be needed to make sure that the
database follows this business rule.
• It is important to document rules like this so that the team
remembers to write the appropriate code and enforce this
business rule.

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Enforcing Nontransferable Relationships
PAY CHECK EMPLOYEE
# id # id
issued to
* pay period * name

the recipient of

PAYCHECKS (PCK)

Key Type Optionality Column Name

the value in this
pk * id foreign-key
column cannot
* pay_period be changed

fk * epe_id

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Mapping of Barred Relationships

• A barred relationship is mapped to a foreign-key column on

the many side, just like any other 1:M relationship.
• In this case, the foreign-key column plays a double role
because it is also part of the primary key.
• In the example, bak_number is a foreign-key column in
ACCOUNTS that refers to the primary key of BANKS.
• It is also part of the primary key of ACCOUNTS.

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Mapping of Barred Relationships
ACCOUNT located in BANK
# number # number
* balance * name
* date opened the location of

ACCOUNTS (ACT)
Key Type Optionality Column Name
pk * act_nbr
* balance
* date_opened
pk,fk * bak_nbr
refers
BANKS (BAK) to
Key Type Optionality Column Name
pk * bank_number
* name

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Relationship Mapping
Cascade Barred Relationships

• Hierarchies can lead to cascade barred relationships, where

the UID of the entity at the top of the hierarchy is carried all
the way down to the UID of the entity at the bottom of the
hierarchy.
• In the example, the UID of ROOM is composed of the ROOM
number, SUITE number, FLOOR number, and BUILDING id.
• This is represented by the barred relationships.

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Cascade Barred Relationships

• When this is mapped to a physical model, the result can be a

very long foreign-key column name because it uses the short
names of the originating tables as a prefix.
• The suggested convention is to never use more than two
table prefixes. In the following example, the foreign-key
column in ROOMS that comes all the way from BUILDINGS is
named sue_bdg_id, instead of sue_flr_bdg_id.

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Cascade Barred Relationships
ROOM located within SUITE located within FLOOR located within BUILDING
# number # number # number # id
the location o tenant the location the location * address
of of of

ROOMS (ROM) SUITES (SUE)

pk * rom_nbr pk * sue_nbr
pk, fk * sue_nbr pk, fk * flr_nbr
pk, fk * sue_flr_nbr pk, fk * flr_bdg_id
pk, fk * sue_bdg_id o tenant

FLOORS (FLR) BUILDINGS (BDG)

pk * flr_nbr pk * id
pk, fk * bdg_id * address

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Cascade Barred Relationship Illustrated

• Sample data for each table illustrates the cascade barred

relationships. SUITES

BUILDINGS sue_nbr flr_nbr flr_bdg

id address 15 2 100
100 40 Potters Lane 25 2 100
201 57G Maricopa Way 5E 1 201
7B 2 201
FLOORS
flr_nbr bdg_id
1 100
2 100 ROOMS

1 201 rom_nbr sue_nbr sue_flr_nbr sue_bdg_id

2 201 1 15 2 100
2 15 2 100

1 7B 2 201

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Relationship Mapping
Mapping Many-to-Many Relationships

• A M:M relationship is resolved with an intersection entity,

which maps to an intersection table.
• This intersection table will contain foreign-key columns that
refer to the originating tables.
• In the example, REVIEWS contains all the combinations that
exist between a CRITIC and a MOVIE.

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Relationship Mapping
Mapping Many-to-Many Relationships
REVIEW
* rating

CRITIC MOVIE
# id # id
* name * title

CRITICS (CTC)
pk * id REVIEWS (RVW)
* name Key Type Optionality Column Name
pk, fk1 * ctc_id
MOVIES (MVE) pk, fk2 * mve_id
pk * id * rating
* title

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Mapping One-to-One Relationships

• When transforming a 1:1 relationship, you create a foreign

key and a unique key.
• All columns of this foreign key are also part of the unique key.
• If the relationship is mandatory on one side, the foreign key is
created in the corresponding table.
• In the example, cbe_code is the foreign-key column in
EMPLOYEES that refers to the primary key of CUBICLES.
• Cbe_code would also be unique within the EMPLOYEES table.

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Mapping One-to-One Relationships
EMPLOYEE CUBILCLE
# id allocated # code
* first_name * description
* last_name allocated to
…..

EMPLOYEES (EPE) CUBICLES (CBE)

pk * id pk * code

* name * description

fk, uk * cbe_code

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Optional One-to-One

• If the relationship is optional on both sides, you can choose

which table gets the foreign key.
• There are no absolute rules, but here are some guidelines:
– Implement the foreign key in the table with fewer rows to
save space.
– Implement the foreign key where it makes more sense for the
business.

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Relationship Mapping
Optional One-to-One

• In the example, a car-rental agency would be more concerned

about cars than spaces, so it makes sense to put the foreign
key in CARS.
• However, in a parking-lot business, the main object is the
parking space.
• Therefore, it would make sense to put the foreign key in
SPACES.

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Business Rules for Optional One-to-One
CAR SPACE
# license plate parked in # id
* model the location for * description

Car-Rental Business

CARS (CAR) SPACES (SPE)

pk * lic_plate pk * id

* model * description

fk, uk o spe_id
Parking-Lot Business

CARS (CAR) SPACES (SPE)

pk * lic_plate pk * id
* model
* description

fk, uk o car_lic_plate

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Enforcing One-to-Many

• If the relationship is mandatory at both ends, you have the

same limitation in the database as a 1:M relationship that is
mandatory at the one end.
• Therefore, you would need to write additional code to
enforce it.

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Mapping Arcs

• The entity that has the arc will map to a table that contains
foreign keys from the tables on the “one” end of the
relationships.
• Note that even if the relationships in the arc are mandatory
on the many side, the resulting foreign keys have to be
optional (because one of them will always be blank).

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Mapping Arcs
COMPANY
MEMBERSHIP held by # id
# id * name
* Start date the holder of * Contact name
* Expiration date
O Termination
held by CUSTOMER
# id
the holder of
* First name
* Last name

COMPANIES (CPE)
MEMBERSHIPS (MBP) pk * id
pk * id * name
* start_date
* contact _name
* expiration_date
CUSTOMERS (CMS)
o termination
pk * id
fk1 o cpe_id
fk2 o cms_id * first_name
* last_name

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Mapping Arcs

• Since the arc represents exclusive relationships, additional

code is needed to enforce that only one of the foreign keys
has a value for every row in the table.
• A check constraint stored in the database can easily do this.
• In the example, the code for the check constraint would look
like this:
– CHECK (pse_id is not null AND phe_id is null)
– OR (pse_id is null AND phe_id is not null)
• If the relationships were fully optional, you would add:
– OR (pse_id is null AND phe_id is null)

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Relationship Mapping
Terminology

Key terms used in this lesson included:

• Cascade barred relationship
• Intersection entity
• Nontransferable relationship

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Relationship Mapping
Summary

In this lesson, you should have learned how to:

• Apply the rule of relationship mapping to correctly transform
1:M and barred relationships
• Apply the rule of relationship mapping to correctly transform
M:M relationships
• Transform 1:1 relationships
• Apply the rule of relationship mapping to correctly transform
relationships in an arc

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Relationship Mapping