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Databases 2 - Assignment Unit 1

The document discusses the fundamentals of entity-relationship (E-R) diagrams in database systems, focusing on a car insurance company's database that includes entities such as Customer, Car, and Accident. It outlines the relationships between these entities, emphasizing the importance of E-R diagrams in modeling real-world scenarios and ensuring data integrity. The conclusion highlights the significance of E-R diagrams in developing robust database systems and facilitating efficient data querying.

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27 views5 pages

Databases 2 - Assignment Unit 1

The document discusses the fundamentals of entity-relationship (E-R) diagrams in database systems, focusing on a car insurance company's database that includes entities such as Customer, Car, and Accident. It outlines the relationships between these entities, emphasizing the importance of E-R diagrams in modeling real-world scenarios and ensuring data integrity. The conclusion highlights the significance of E-R diagrams in developing robust database systems and facilitating efficient data querying.

Uploaded by

hometurtle12
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd

1

Unit 1: Understanding Entity-Relationship Diagrams in Database Systems

University of the People

CS 3306-01 Databases 2

May 27,2025
2

Understanding Entity-Relationship Diagrams in Database Systems

Unit 1 brings us to the basics of database systems, i.e., data modeling and entity-

relationship (E-R) diagrams. One of the primary problems of database design is the accurate

modeling of real-world entities and their relationships between each other. In this assignment, we

give an E-R diagram for an automobile-insurance company where the customers have one or

more cars, and a car can have zero or more accidents reported.

Overview of the Scenario

The car insurance company's database must store the three main entities: Customer, Car,

and Accident. One customer may own multiple cars, but one car belongs to a sole customer. One

car can have zero to multiple accidents stored. This schema supports the modelling of all the data

in the relational database format.

E-R Diagram Description

Below is the step-by-step account of the entities and relationships:

 Entity: Customer

Fields: Customer ID (Primary Key), Name, Address, Phone Number

 Entity: Car

Attributes: Car ID (Primary Key), License Plate, Model, Year, Customer ID (Foreign

Key)

 Entity: Accident

Attributes: Accident ID (Primary Key), Date, Location, Damage Cost, Car ID (Foreign

Key)
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 Relationship: Owns

Type: One-to-Many

Description: The customer can have multiple cars.

 Relationship: Involved In:

One-to-Many Description: A car may be involved in zero or more accidents.

The relationships are depicted in the below E-R diagram:


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Significance of the E-R Diagram

This E-R diagram shows how well the entity-relationship model can handle the semantics

of a business topic. Silberschatz et al. (2002) say that E-R diagrams help writers see and build

databases well so that they can model real-life situations in a logical way. These kinds of pictures

help clear up confusion, keep data safe, and make relational databases more common

(Silberschatz, Korth, & Sudarshan, 2002).

The relational data model we talked about in Chapter 3 builds on the E-R diagram model

by putting entities and relationships into tables and using primary and foreign keys to set limits

(Silberschatz et al., 2002). In order to query these databases successfully, you also need to know

relational algebra and relational calculus (Silberschatz et al., 2002).

Conclusion

In summary, creating an E-R diagram lays the groundwork for developing resilient

database systems. The diagram created in this assignment exemplifies a real-world insurance

situation and demonstrates the concepts of Unit 1. The system design facilitates data integrity,

efficient querying, and logical data structuring by correlating entities such as customers,

vehicles, and incidents, while understanding their interrelations.


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References

Silberschatz, A., Korth, H. F., & Sudarshan, S. (2002). Database system concepts (4th ed.).

McGraw-Hill. Retrieved from

[Link]

%20System%20Concepts%204th%20Edition%20By%20Silberschatz-Korth-

[Link]

TechRepublic. (n.d.). Whitepapers. [Link]

BitPipe. (n.d.). [Link]

SearchCloudComputing. (n.d.). [Link]

Light Reading. (n.d.). [Link]

SANS Institute. (n.d.). [Link]

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