190 likes | 527 Views
MBA 664 Database Management. Dave Salisbury salisbury@udayton.edu (email) http://www.davesalisbury.com/ (web site). Evolution of the E-R Model. Basic E-R Model nearly 25 years old complex data relationships and new database technology have outgrown it in some respects Enhanced E-R Model
E N D
MBA 664Database Management Dave Salisbury salisbury@udayton.edu (email) http://www.davesalisbury.com/ (web site)
Evolution of the E-R Model • Basic E-R Model • nearly 25 years old • complex data relationships and new database technology have outgrown it in some respects • Enhanced E-R Model • a response to the shortcomings of the basic E-R model • not universally agreed upon in some respects • introduced the supertype/subtype relationship
Supertype/Subtype Relationships • Supertype (example: Employee) • a generic entity that has a relationship with one or more subtypes • Subtype (example: Manager) • a subgrouping of a supertype entity that is meaningful to an organization • shares all attributes of its supertype, but also has unique attributes of its own and/or : • has relationships with other entities distinct from those of other subtypes
The student example STUDENT UNDERGRAD STUDENT GRAD STUDENT
Two Rules for When to Use Supertype/Subtypes Use this type of relationship when either (or both) of the following are present: • When there are attributes that apply to some (but not all) of the instances of an entity type • When the instances of a subtype participate in a relationship unique to that subtype
Attribute Inheritance • “The property by which subtype entities inherit values of all attributes of the supertype. • This important property makes it unnecessary to include supertype attributes redundantly with the subtypes.”
Name City/State/Zip SSN EMPLOYEE Telephone HOURLY EMPLOYEE SALARIED EMPLOYEE CONSULTANT Annual_Salary Stock_Option Contract_Number Billing_Rate Hourly_Rate Supertype/Subtype Example 1
Generalization The process of defining a more general entity type from a set of more specialized entity types A “bottom-up” approach Specialization The process of defining one or more subtypes of a general entity based on distinguishing attri-butes or relationships A “top-down” approach Two Processes to Develop Supertype/Subtypes Both approaches can be used together
Completeness Addresses the question of whether an instance of a supertype must also be a member of at least one subtype Disjointness Addresses the question of whether an instance of a supertype may simultaneously be a member of two (or more) subtypes Supertype/Subtype Constraints
Completeness Constraint: Two Possible Rules • Total Specialization Rule (Double-Line) • Specifies that each entity instance of the supertype must be a member of some subtype in the relationship (Example: all STUDENTS are either UNDERGRADUATE or GRADUATE students) • Partial Specialization Rule (Single-line) • Specifies that an entity instance of the supertype is allowed to not belong to any subtype (Example: FACULTY and STAFF are not the only possible members of the entity EMPLOYEE)
Completeness constraint Total specialization Partial specialization
Can an entity instance simultaneously be a member of two or more subtypes? Disjointed constraint Disjoint rule Overlap rule
Subtype discriminators Attribute of the supertype whose value determines to which subtype an instance belongs
Arrangement of super- and subtypes where each subtype has only one supertype. Supertype/subtype hierarchy