ENTITY-RELATIONSHIP MODELING

ENTITY-RELATIONSHIP MODEL
 Based on the perception of real world that
consists of a collection of basic objects,
called entities and of relationship among
entity sets.
 used to visually represents data objects.

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ENTITY TYPES
 A group of objects with the same properties,
which are identified by the enterprise as
having an independent existence.

ENTITY OCCURRENCE
 Uniquely identifiable object of an entity type.

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RELATIONSHIP TYPES
 A set of meaningful associations among
entity types.
 Associations between one or more
participating entity types.
 Each relationship types is given a name that
describes its function.

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RELATIONSHIP OCCURRENCE
 Uniquely identifiable association, which
includes one occurrence from each
participating entity type.

Relationship
Name

Staff has Branch

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DEGREE OF RELATIONSHIP TYPE
 The number of participating entity types in a
relationship.
 The number of participants in a relationship
type is called the degree of that relationship.
 Therefore the degree of a relationship
indicates the number of entity types involved
in a relationship.

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DEGREE OF RELATIONSHIP TYPE
A relationship of degree two is called
binary.
A relationship of degree three is called
ternary.

has Branch
Staff

Staff register a
client at a branch.
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Client
DEGREE OF RELATIONSHIP TYPE
 A relationship of degree four is called
quaternary. A solicitor arranges
a bid on behalf of a
buyer supported by
Solicitor a financial
institution.

arrange
Financial
Buyer
institution

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Bid
RECURSIVE RELATIONSHIP
 A relationship type when the same entity type
participates more then once in different roles.
 this types of relationship are sometimes
called unary relationship.
 Relationship may be given role names to
indicate the purpose that each participating
entity type plays in a relationship.

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RECURSIVE RELATIONSHIP

Role Name

Supervise

Supervisor

Supervises Staff
Role Name

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 RECURSIVE RELATIONSHIP
Entities associated
Role Name through two distinct
relationship

Manager Branch Office

Manages
Staff Branch
has
Member of Staff Branch Office

Role Name
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ATTRIBUTES
 A property of an entity or a relationship type.
 For example: a STAFF entity may be describe
by the StaffNo, name, position and salary.

ATTRIBUTE DOMAIN
 The set of allowable values for one or more
attributes. Attributes may share a domain.
 For example: address attributes of branch,
private owner and business owner entity share
the same domain of all the possible addresses.
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SIMPLE ATTRIBUTE
 An attribute composed of a single component
with an independent existence.
 Ex. Staff entity has a simple attribute of Position
and salary.

COMPOSITE ATTRIBUTE
 An attribute composed of multiple components,
each with an independent existence.
 Ex. address attribute can be subdivided into
street, city and postcode.
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SINGLE-VALUED ATTRIBUTE
 An attribute that holds a single value for each
occurrence of an entity type.

MULTI-VALUED ATTRIBUTE
 An attribute that holds multiple values for
each occurrence of an entity type.
 Ex. branch entity type can have multiple
values for the telNo.
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STRONG ENTITY TYPE
 An entity type that is not existence
dependent on some other entity type.

WEAK ENTITY TYPE

 An entity type that is existence-dependent on
some other entity type.

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STRONG AND WEAK ENTITY
Strong Weak
entity entity

CLIENT
clientNo. states PREFERENCES
Name prefType
fname maxRent
lname
telNo.

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PROBLEMS WITH ER MODEL
 FAN TRAPS – Where a model represents a
relationship between entity types but the
pathway between certain entity occurrences
is ambiguous.

operates
has
Staff division Branch
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PROBLEMS WITH ER MODEL
 CHASM TRAPS – Where a model suggests
the existence of a relationship between entity
types, but the pathway does not exist
between certain entity occurrences.

oversees
has Property for
Branch Staff rent

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