Member Avatar for Latent12

Hello all,

I have to design an ERD Diagram and a data flow model for a project assignment. I just want to know if I am on the right track.

The question is as follows:

"The short course institute runs computing courses for members of the public and IT professionals. The institute offers certification from many of the major computing organizations (e.g. Oracle Certification, .Net Certification , C# etc.). The organizations provide the certification tests.

The courses are scheduled a year in advance and then marketed in trade magazines and on the internet. Bookings are received either by phone or over the web. Bookings are taken from individuals or from companies who may choose to take advantage of a discount available for multiple bookings. A multiple booking will be for more than two places and a discount of 20% is available. The number of places on a course is limited based on the size of the room where it will be delivered. Applicants will pay 10% of the course fee to reserve a place and will be invoiced for the remainder of the fee two weeks before the start of the course. An applicant may cancel and request a refund up to one week in advance of the course but they will lose their deposit.

The institute has 6 rooms of varying sizes available for delivery of on-site courses. All the rooms are equipped with state-of-the-art technology.

On completing the course applicants may opt to do the certification test. This must be paid in advance. An applicant can apply to take the certification anytime within one year of having taken the course. The tutors mark the test and a certificate is sent to the successful applicants.

A company can also arrange to have a course delivered on-site. There is a one off payment for this regardless of the number of employees who attend. These courses can be arranged at reasonably short notice. This must be agreed with the tutor who will deliver the course. However the company must pay in advance and there is no cancellation permitted for this form of delivery. The fee for delivering on-site is negotiated with the tutor in advance and can vary for each delivery.

The short course institute uses 15 tutors to deliver courses. These are paid on a consultancy basis for the actual courses delivered. When they complete a course they will invoice the institute.
The institute has requested an information system in order to manage the processing of the various types of booking, cancellations, assessments and the payment of tutors. They are aiming to use this specification to outsource the development of the system to a software house in India."

Develop an ERD and Data Flow model of this scenario

models.docx (1942.18 KB)
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  • Latest Post Latest Post by Shadiya
Member Avatar for Latent12

Can anyone help or give any advice?

Member Avatar for drjohn

Identify the entities and the items of data that are being stored. Assign the items of data to each entity - you may discover one entity is actually two, or that two entities are actually the same thing.

do this by using two highlighter pens and a copy of the assignment - one colour for entities, the other for data. when you start to relate them, you are writing out the entities and their attributes, and that's your database. Watch for situations where you need a link table to join two tables in a many to many relationship.

Edited by drjohn because: n/a
Member Avatar for idcj

Categorize your tables and objects into entities and relationships. You could start by identifying significant objects like courses, students and rooms. Then fill in attributes like what needs to be captured to uniquely identify instances of each one of them. Then you can look at what links and relationships exist between them. This picture is nothing but a Data Model.

There is a very nice tool to build ER diagrams and try out relationships and links without much effort or knowledge about DBs. Check out my signature for more information.

Member Avatar for Shadiya

(TMAsystem allows students to submit their answers to Tutor-marked assignments(TMAs ) electronically, as computer files, to the University via a website. Whenever a TMA file submitted, it is stored in central database and receipt(a simple message containing auniq number) is sent to the email,that a TMA is waiting for them to be marked

The system enables tutor to download their student's submissions, mark and comment on the assignments 'on-screen' and submit the marked TMA back to the University. Amarked TMA is stored in a database and the student is informed, by email,that their TMA has been marked and available to be retrived electronically

pls I help from you I want to Know the entities(Input&output)
and I want to Know how to do the ERD???
Thank's

Member Avatar for Shadiya

Please can I get help from you????????

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