Modern Database

management system
Unit – 2 DATABASE DESIGN

15/03/2025 MDBMS Ms.Sangeetha Priya.B , AP/CSE IOT 1

Entity-Relationship model
• We typically follow the below steps for designing a database for an application.
• Gather the requirements (functional and data) by asking questions to the
database users.

• Do a logical or conceptual design of the database. This is where ER model plays a

role. It is the most used graphical representation of the conceptual design of a
database.

• Physical Database Design (Like indexing) and external design (like views)

• The Entity Relationship Model is a model for identifying entities (like student, car
or company) to be represented in the database and representation of how those
entities are related. The ER data model specifies enterprise schema that
represents the overall logical structure of a database graphically.
15/03/2025 MDBMS Ms.Sangeetha Priya.B , AP/CSE IOT 2
Why Use ER Diagrams In DBMS

• ER diagrams represent the E-R model in a database, making them easy to

convert into relations (tables).

• ER diagrams provide the purpose of real-world modeling of objects which

makes them intently useful.

• ER diagrams require no technical knowledge of the underlying DBMS

used.

• It gives a standard solution for visualizing the data logically.

15/03/2025 MDBMS Ms.Sangeetha Priya.B , AP/CSE IOT 3
 Symbols Used in ER Model

• ER Model is used to model the logical view of the system from a data
perspective which consists of these symbols:
• Rectangles: Rectangles represent Entities in the ER Model.

• Ellipses: Ellipses represent Attributes in the ER Model.

• Diamond: Diamonds represent Relationships among Entities.

• Lines: Lines represent attributes to entities and entity sets with other
relationship types.

• Double Ellipse: Double Ellipses represent Multi-Valued Attributes.

• Double Rectangle: Double Rectangle represents a Weak Entity.

15/03/2025 MDBMS Ms.Sangeetha Priya.B , AP/CSE IOT 4
15/03/2025 MDBMS Ms.Sangeetha Priya.B , AP/CSE IOT 5
15/03/2025 MDBMS Ms.Sangeetha Priya.B , AP/CSE IOT 6
15/03/2025 MDBMS Ms.Sangeetha Priya.B , AP/CSE IOT 7
Types of Entity

• There are two types of entity:

• 1. Strong Entity

• A Strong Entity is a type of entity that has a key

Attribute. Strong Entity does not depend on other Entity
in the Schema. It has a primary key, that helps in
identifying it uniquely, and it is represented by a
rectangle. These are called Strong Entity Types.

15/03/2025 MDBMS Ms.Sangeetha Priya.B , AP/CSE IOT 8

Weak Entity
• An Entity type has a key attribute that uniquely identifies each
entity in the entity set. But some entity type exists for which key
attributes can’t be defined. These are called Weak Entity types .
• For Example, A company may store the information of
dependents (Parents, Children, Spouse) of an Employee. But the
dependents can’t exist without the employee. So Dependent will
be a Weak Entity Type and Employee will be Identifying Entity
type for Dependent, which means it is Strong Entity Type .
• A weak entity type is represented by a Double Rectangle. The
participation of weak entity types is always total. The
relationship between the weak entity type and its identifying
strong entity type is called identifying relationship and it is
represented by a double diamond.

15/03/2025 MDBMS Ms.Sangeetha Priya.B , AP/CSE IOT 9

15/03/2025 MDBMS Ms.Sangeetha Priya.B , AP/CSE IOT 10
 Attributes
• Attributes are the properties that define the entity type.
For example, Roll_No, Name, DOB, Age, Address, and
Mobile_No are the attributes that define entity type
Student. In ER diagram, the attribute is represented by
an oval.

15/03/2025 MDBMS Ms.Sangeetha Priya.B , AP/CSE IOT 11

Types of Attributes
• 1. Key Attribute

• The attribute which uniquely identifies each

entity in the entity set is called the key attribute. For
example, Roll_No will be unique for each student. In ER
diagram, the key attribute is represented by an oval
with underlying lines.

15/03/2025 MDBMS Ms.Sangeetha Priya.B , AP/CSE IOT 12

• Composite Attribute

• An attribute composed of many other attributes is

called a composite attribute. For example, the Address
attribute of the student Entity type consists of Street,
City, State, and Country. In ER diagram, the composite
attribute is represented by an oval comprising of ovals.

15/03/2025 MDBMS Ms.Sangeetha Priya.B , AP/CSE IOT 13

• 3. Multivalued Attribute

• An attribute consisting of more than one value for a

given entity. For example, Phone_No (can be more than
one for a given student). In ER diagram, a multivalued
attribute is represented by a double oval.

15/03/2025 MDBMS Ms.Sangeetha Priya.B , AP/CSE IOT 14

• 4. Derived Attribute
• An attribute that can be derived from other attributes of the entity
type is known as a derived attribute. e.g.; Age (can be derived from
DOB). In ER diagram, the derived attribute is represented by a dashed
oval.

15/03/2025 MDBMS Ms.Sangeetha Priya.B , AP/CSE IOT 15

• The Complete Entity Type Student with its Attributes can be
represented as:

15/03/2025 MDBMS Ms.Sangeetha Priya.B , AP/CSE IOT 16

 Relationship Type and Relationship Set

• A Relationship Type represents the association between

entity types. For example, ‘Enrolled in’ is a relationship
type that exists between entity type Student and
Course. In ER diagram, the relationship type is
represented by a diamond and connecting the entities
with lines.

15/03/2025 MDBMS Ms.Sangeetha Priya.B , AP/CSE IOT 17

• A set of relationships of the same type is known as a
relationship set. The following relationship set depicts
S1 as enrolled in C2, S2 as enrolled in C1, and S3 as
registered in C3.

15/03/2025 MDBMS Ms.Sangeetha Priya.B , AP/CSE IOT 18

 Degree of a Relationship Set
• The number of different entity sets participating in a
relationship set is called the
degree of a relationship set.
• 1. Unary Relationship: When there is only ONE entity
set participating in a relation, the relationship is called a
unary relationship. For example, one person is married
to only one person.

15/03/2025 MDBMS Ms.Sangeetha Priya.B , AP/CSE IOT 19

• 2. Binary Relationship: When there are TWO entities
set participating in a relationship, the relationship is
called a binary relationship. For example, a Student is
enrolled in a Course.

15/03/2025 MDBMS Ms.Sangeetha Priya.B , AP/CSE IOT 20

• 3. Ternary Relationship: When there are three entity
sets participating in a relationship, the relationship is
called a ternary relationship.
• 4. N-ary Relationship: When there are n entities set
participating in a relationship, the relationship is called
an n-ary relationship.

15/03/2025 MDBMS Ms.Sangeetha Priya.B , AP/CSE IOT 21

What is Cardinality?

• The number of times an entity of an entity set

participates in a relationship set is known as cardinality
. Cardinality can be of different types:
• 1. One-to-One: When each entity in each entity set
can take part only once in the relationship, the
cardinality is one-to-one. Let us assume that a male can
marry one female and a female can marry one male. So
the relationship will be one-to-one.
• the total number of tables that can be used in this is 2.

15/03/2025 MDBMS Ms.Sangeetha Priya.B , AP/CSE IOT 22

15/03/2025 MDBMS Ms.Sangeetha Priya.B , AP/CSE IOT 23
• One-to-Many: In one-to-many mapping as well where
each entity can be related to more than one entity and
the total number of tables that can be used in this is 2.
Let us assume that one surgeon department can
accommodate many doctors. So the Cardinality will be 1
to M. It means one department has many Doctors.
• total number of tables that can used is 3.

15/03/2025 MDBMS Ms.Sangeetha Priya.B , AP/CSE IOT 24

15/03/2025 MDBMS Ms.Sangeetha Priya.B , AP/CSE IOT 25
• 3. Many-to-One: When entities in one entity set can take part only
once in the relationship set and entities in other entity sets can
take part more than once in the relationship set, cardinality is
many to one. Let us assume that a student can take only one
course but one course can be taken by many students. So the
cardinality will be n to 1. It means that for one course there can be
n students but for one student, there will be only one course.

• The total number of tables that can be used in this is 3.

15/03/2025 MDBMS Ms.Sangeetha Priya.B , AP/CSE IOT 26
15/03/2025 MDBMS Ms.Sangeetha Priya.B , AP/CSE IOT 27
• 4. Many-to-Many: When entities in all entity sets can take part more
than once in the relationship cardinality is many to many. Let us
assume that a student can take more than one course and one course
can be taken by many students. So the relationship will be many to
many.

• the total number of tables that can be used in this is 3.

15/03/2025 MDBMS Ms.Sangeetha Priya.B , AP/CSE IOT 28

15/03/2025 MDBMS Ms.Sangeetha Priya.B , AP/CSE IOT 29
Participation Constraint
• Participation Constraint is applied to the entity participating in the relationship set.

• 1. Total Participation – Each entity in the entity set must participate in the relationship.
If each student must enroll in a course, the participation of students will be total. Total
participation is shown by a double line in the ER diagram.

• 2. Partial Participation – The entity in the entity set may or may NOT participate in the
relationship. If some courses are not enrolled by any of the students, the participation in
the course will be partial.

• The diagram depicts the ‘Enrolled in’ relationship set with Student Entity set having total
participation and Course Entity set having partial participation.
15/03/2025 MDBMS Ms.Sangeetha Priya.B , AP/CSE IOT 30
15/03/2025 MDBMS Ms.Sangeetha Priya.B , AP/CSE IOT 31
How to Draw ER Diagram?

• The very first step is Identifying all the Entities, and place them in a Rectangle, and labeling
them accordingly.

• The next step is to identify the relationship between them and place them accordingly using
the Diamond, and make sure that, Relationships are not connected to each other.

• Attach attributes to the entities properly.

• Remove redundant entities and relationships.

• Add proper colors to highlight the data present in the database.

15/03/2025 MDBMS Ms.Sangeetha Priya.B , AP/CSE IOT 32