Homework 5:  Database design

Database Systems
Spring, 2020
Due:  March 15 (11:59 pm)
Revised deadline:  March 22 (11:59 pm)

You may work with one partner on this assignment.

The objective of this assignment is to design a database of your own choice using the Entity-Relationship model.  You can start by identifying an application area you would like to model with your database.  Choose an area with which you have some familiarity.

Try to choose an application that is relatively substantial, but not too enormous.  For example, your E-R diagram should have in the range of six to ten entity sets and a similar number of relationships.  You should include examples of many-to-many, many-to-one, and is-a relationships.

Write a short description of the database.  Your description should be brief and relatively informal.  It should describe the data, the applications which will operate on the database, and the end users who will use the database.  It should include a brief description of each entity set and relationship.  For each relationship, you should indicate why you chose the type of relationship (i.e., many-many, many-one, is-a) you did.  Your description will be graded on completeness and conciseness.  Keep in mind that I may not have as much familiarity with your application domain as you do.

Construct an E-R diagram for your proposed database.  Use the notational conventions of Ullman, including underlining key attributes and using arrowheads to indicate multiplicity of relationships.  You may, if you choose, list the attributes of each entity set and relationship on a separate paper.

Then translate your E-R diagram into a relational schema, using the method described in Ullman.

Note:  Do not use multivalued attributes or composite attributes in your design.

Use gradescope to hand in: