E-R Model to Relational Model

E-R Model to Relational Model

• Entity Sets to Tables
• Main Idea
• Each entity set maps to a new table
• Each attribute maps to a new table column
• Each relationship set maps to either new table
columns or to a new table
 E-R Model to Relational Model
• Entity Sets to Tables
• (Representing Strong Entity Sets)
• Entity set E with attributes a1,..,an translates to
table E with attributes a1,a2..an
• Primary key of entity set
• 
• primary key of table
 E-R Model to Relational Model
• example

Students
mn name age email
       
       
 E-R Model to Relational Model
• Weak entity set E translates to table E
• A weak entity can be identified uniquely only by
considering the primary key of another (owner)
entity.
• – Owner entity set and weak entity set must
participate in a one-to-many relationship set (1
owner, many weak entities).
• – When the owner entity is deleted, all owned
weak entities must also be deleted.
 E-R Model to Relational Model
• Weak entity set E translates to table E
• CREATE TABLE Policy (
• pname CHAR(20),
• age INTEGER,
• cost NUMBER(10,2),
• ssn CHAR(11),
• PRIMARY KEY (pname, ssn),
• FOREIGN KEY (ssn) REFERENCES Employees,
• ON DELETE CASCADE)

Policy
pname age cost ssn
 E-R Model to Relational Model
• Relationship Sets to Tables
• Columns of table R should include
• Attributes of the relationship set
• Primary key attributes of each component entity
set
 E-R Model to Relational Model
• Relationship Sets (without Constraints) to Tables
• Create a table for the relationship set.
• Add all primary keys of the participating entity
sets as fields of the table.
• Add fields of attribute in the relationship.
• Declare a primary key using all key fields from
the entity sets.
• Declare foreign key constraints for all these
fields from the entity sets.
 E-R Model to Relational Model
• Relationship Sets (without Constraints) to Tables

Students Courses
mn name age email code name year
             

Takes
mn code mark
     
 E-R Model to Relational Model
• Relationship Sets (without Constraints) to Tables
Students
Mn name age email
       

Courses
code name year
     

Takes
mn code mark
     
 E-R Model to Relational Model
• Relationship Sets (with Constraints) to Tables
• Create a table for the relationship set.
• Add all primary keys of the participating entity sets as
fields of the table.
• Add a field for each attribute of the relationship.
• Declare a primary key using the key fields from the
source entity set only.
• Declare foreign key constraints for all the fields from
the source and target entity sets.
 E-R Model to Relational Model
• Relationship Sets (with Constraints) to Tables

Students
DoS
mn name email Staff id

Directed By
mn Staff id
 E-R Model to Relational Model
• Relationship Sets (with Constraints) to Tables

• create table Directed By (

• mn char(8),
• staff id char(8),
• primary key (mn),
• foreign key (mn) references Students,
• foreign key (staff id) references DoS );
• Note that this has captured the key constraint,
but not the participation constraint.
 E-R Model to Relational Model
• Mapping relationship sets (with key constraints,
2nd method)
• Create a table for the source and target entity
sets as usual.
• • Add every primary key field of the target as a
field in the source.
• • Declare these fields as foreign keys.
 E-R Model to Relational Model
• Mapping relationship sets (with key constraints, 2nd
method)

• create table Students (

• mn char(8),
• name char(20),
• age integer,
• email char(15), Directed
mn
By
Staff id name email
• staff id char(8),
• primary key (mn),
• foreign key (staff id) references DoS )
• Note that this has still not included the participation
constraint on
 E-R Model to Relational Model
• Null values
• In SQL, a field can have the special value null
• A null value means that a field is either
unknown/missing/unavailable, or
undefined/makes no sense here.
• Some implementations do not allow the null
value to appear in primary key fields.
 E-R Model to Relational Model
• Mapping relationship sets with
key+participation constraints
• Create a table for the source and target entity
sets as usual.
• Add every primary key field of the target as a
field in the source.
• Declare these fields as not null.
• Declare these fields as foreign keys.
 E-R Model to Relational Model

• create table Students (

• mn char(8),
• name char(20),
Directed By
• age integer, mn Staff id name age email Staff id
• email char(15),
• staff id char(8) not null,
• primary key (mn),
• foreign key (staff id) references DoS )
 E-R Model to Relational Model
• Mapping weak entity sets and identifying
relationships
• Create a table for the weak entity set.
• Make each attribute of the weak entity set a field
of the table.
• Add fields for the primary key attributes of the
identifying owner.
• Declare a foreign key constraint on these
identifying owner fields.
• Instruct the system to automatically delete any
tuples in the table for which there are no owners
 E-R Model to Relational Model

• create table is_Located_In (

• number char(8),
• capacity integer,
• name char(20),
• primary key (number, name),
• foreign key (name) references Buildings
• on delete cascade )
 E-R Model to Relational Model
• Translating class hierarchies
• Declare a table as usual for the superclass of the
hierarchy.
• For each subclass declare another table using
superclass’s primary key and the subclass’s extra
attributes.
• Declare the primary key from the superclass as
the primary key of the subclass, and with a
foreign key constraint.
 E-R Model to Relational Model

• create table PT Students (

• mn char(8),
• pt frac integer,
• primary key (mn),
• foreign key (mn) references Students )
E-R Model to Relational Model
 E-R Model to Relational Model
• Translating class hierarchies
• As in C++, or other PLs, attributes are inherited.
• When declare A ISA B, every A entity is also considered to be a B entity.
• Overlap constraints: Can Joe be an Hourly_Emps as well as a
Contract_Emps entity? (Allowed/disallowed)
• Covering constraints: Does every Employees entity also have to be
an Hourly_Emps or a Contract_Emps entity? (Yes/no)
 E-R Model to Relational Model
• Translating class hierarchies
• General approach:
• – 3 relations: Employees, Hourly_Emps and Contract_Emps.
• • Hourly_Emps: Every employee is recorded in Employees.
• For hourly emps, extra info recorded in Hourly_Emps
(hourly_wages, hours_worked, ssn); must delete Hourly_Emps
tuple if referenced Employees tuple is deleted).
• • Queries involving all employees easy, those involving just
Hourly_Emps require a join to get some attributes.
• • Alternative: Just Hourly_Emps and Contract_Emps.
• – Hourly_Emps: ssn, name, lot, hourly_wages, hours_worked.
• – Each employee must be in one of these two subclasses.
E-R Model to Relational Model