Relational Model

Introduction
ƒ Proposed by E.F. Codd in the early seventies.
ƒ Most of the modern DBMS are relational.
ƒ Simple and elegant model with mathematical basis.
ƒ Led to the development of a theory of data dependencies
and database design.
ƒ Relational algebra operations –
crucial role in query optimization & execution.
ƒ Laid the foundation for the development of
ƒ Tuple relational calculus and then
ƒ Database standard SQL

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 1

Department of CS&E, IITM
Relation Scheme
ƒ Consists of relation name, and a set of attributes or field
names or column names. Each attribute has an associated
domain.
ƒ Example:
student ( studentName : string,
rollNumber : string,
phoneNumber : integer,
Relation yearOfAdmission : integer,
name branchOfStudy : string )

Attribute domains
names
ƒ Domain – set of atomic (or indivisible ) values – data type

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 2

Department of CS&E, IITM
Relation Instance
ƒ A finite set of tuples constitute a relation instance.
ƒ A tuple of relation with scheme R = (A1, A2, … , Am)
is an ordered sequence of values
(v1,v2, ... ,vm) such that vi ∈ domain (Ai), 1≤ i ≤ m

student
yearOf phoneNumber branch
studentName rollNumber
Admission Of Study
Sriram CS04B123 2004 9840110489 CS
Rajesh CS04B125 2004 9840110490 EC
…

No duplicate tuples ( or rows ) in a relation instance.

We shall later see that in SQL, duplicate rows would be allowed in tables.
Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 3
Department of CS&E, IITM
Keys for a Relation (1/2)
• Key: A set of attributes K, whose values uniquely identify a
tuple in any instance. And none of the proper subsets
of K has this property
Example: {rollNumber} is a key for student relation.
{rollNumber, name} – values can uniquely identify a tuple
• but the set is not minimal
• not a Key
• A key can not be determined from any particular instance data
ƒ it is an intrinsic property of a scheme
ƒ it can only be determined from the meaning of attributes

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 4

Department of CS&E, IITM
Keys for a Relation (2/2)
ƒ A relation can have more than one key.
ƒ Each of the keys is called a candidate key
Example: book (isbnNo, authorName, title, publisher, year)
(Assumption : books have only one author )
Keys: {isbnNo}, {authorName, title}
ƒ A relation has at least one key
- the set of all attributes, in case no proper subset is a key.
ƒ Superkey: A set of attributes that contains any key as a subset.
ƒ A key can also be defined as a minimal superkey
ƒ Primary Key: One of the candidate keys chosen for indexing
purposes ( More details later…)

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 5

Department of CS&E, IITM
Relational Database Scheme and Instance
Relational database scheme: D consist of a finite no. of
relation schemes and a set I of integrity constraints.
Integrity constraints: Necessary conditions to be satisfied by
the data values in the relational instances so that the set
of data values constitute a meaningful database
• domain constraints
• key constraints
• referential integrity constraints
Database instance: Collection of relational instances satisfying
the integrity constraints.

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 6

Department of CS&E, IITM
Domain and Key Constraints
• Domain Constraints: Attributes have associated domains
Domain – set of atomic data values of a specific type.
Constraint – stipulates that the actual values of an
attribute in any tuple must belong to the declared domain.
• Key Constraint: Relation scheme – associated keys
Constraint – if K is supposed to be a key for scheme R,
any relation instance r on R should not have two tuples
that have identical values for attributes in K.
Also, none of the key attributes can have null value.

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 7

Department of CS&E, IITM
Foreign Keys
• Tuples in one relation, say r1(R1), often need to refer to tuples
in another relation, say r2(R2)
• to capture relationships between entities
• Primary Key of R2 : K = {B1, B2, …, Bj}
• A set of attributes F = {A1, A2, …, Aj} of R1 such that
dom(Ai) = dom(Bi), 1≤ i ≤ j and
whose values are used to refer to tuples in r2
is called a foreign key in R1 referring to R2.
• R1, R2 can be the same scheme also.
• There can be more than one foreign key in a relation scheme

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 8

Department of CS&E, IITM
 Foreign Key – Examples(1/2)
Foreign key attribute deptNo of course relation refers to
Primary key attribute deptID of department relation

Course Department
courseId name credits deptNo deptId name hod phone

CS635 ALGORITHMS 3 1 1 COMPUTER CS01 22576235

SCIENCE
CS636 A.I 4 1
2 ELECTRICAL ES01 22576234
ES456 D.S.P 3 2 ENGG

ME650 AERO 3 3 3 MECHANICAL ME01 22576233

DYNAMIC ENGG

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 9

Department of CS&E, IITM
Foreign Key – Examples(2/2)
It is possible for a foreign key in a relation
to refer to the primary key of the relation itself

An Example:

univEmployee ( empNo, name, sex, salary, dept, reportsTo)

reportsTo is a foreign key referring to empNo of the same relation

Every employee in the university reports to some other

employee for administrative purposes
- except the vice-chancellor, of course!

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 10

Department of CS&E, IITM
Referential Integrity Constraint (RIC)
• Let F be a foreign key in scheme R1 referring to scheme R2
and let K be the primary key of R2.
• RIC: any relational instance r1on R1, r2 on R2 must be s.t
for any tuple t in r1, either its F-attribute values are null
or they are identical to the K-attribute values of some
tuple in r2.
• RIC ensures that references to tuples in r2 are for currently
existing tuples.
• That is, there are no dangling references.

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 11

Department of CS&E, IITM
Referential Integrity Constraint (RIC) - Example
COURSE DEPARTMENT

courseId name credits deptNo deptId name hod phone

CS635 ALGORITHMS 3 1 1 COMPUTER CS01 22576235

SCIENCE
CS636 A.I 4 1
2 ELECTRICAL ES01 22576234
ES456 D.S.P 3 2 ENGG.

ME650 AERO 3 3 3 MECHANICAL ME01 22576233

DYNAMIC ENGG.

CE751 MASS 3 4
TRANSFER

The new course refers to a non-existent department and thus

violates the RIC

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 12

Department of CS&E, IITM
Example Relational Scheme
student (rollNo, name, degree, year, sex, deptNo, advisor)
Here, degree is the program ( B Tech, M Tech, M S, Ph D
etc) for which the student has joined. Year is the year of
admission and advisor is the EmpId of a faculty member
identified as the student’s advisor.

department (deptId, name, hod, phone)

Here, phone is that of the department’s office.

professor (empId, name, sex, startYear, deptNo, phone)

Here, startYear is the year of joining of the faculty member
in the department deptNo.

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 13

Department of CS&E, IITM
Example Relational Scheme
course (courseId, cname, credits, deptNo)
Here, deptNo indicates the department that offers the course.

enrollment (rollNo, courseId, sem, year, grade)

Here, sem can be either “odd” or “even” indicating the two
semesters of an academic year. The value of grade will
be null for the current semester and non-null for past
semesters.

teaching (empId, courseId, sem, year, classRoom)

preRequisite (preReqCourse, courseID)

Here, if (c1, c2) is a tuple, it indicates that c1 should be
successfully completed before enrolling for c2.
Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 14
Department of CS&E, IITM
Example Relational Scheme
student (rollNo, name, degree, year, sex, deptNo, advisor)

department (deptId, name, hod, phone)

professor (empId, name, sex, startYear, deptNo, phone)

course (courseId, cname, credits, deptNo)

enrollment (rollNo, courseId, sem, year, grade)

teaching (empId, courseId, sem, year, classRoom)

preRequisite (preReqCourse, courseID)

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 15

Department of CS&E, IITM
Example Relational Scheme with RIC’s shown
student (rollNo, name, degree, year, sex, deptNo, advisor)

department (deptId, name, hod, phone)

professor (empId, name, sex, startYear, deptNo, phone)

course (courseId, cname, credits, deptNo)

enrollment (rollNo, courseId, sem, year, grade)

teaching (empId, courseId, sem, year, classRoom)

preRequisite (preReqCourse, courseID)

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 16

Department of CS&E, IITM
Relational Algebra
ƒ A set of operators (unary & binary) that take relation
instances as arguments and return new relations.
ƒ Gives a procedural method of specifying a retrieval query.
ƒ Forms the core component of a relational query engine.
ƒ SQL queries are internally translated into RA expressions.
ƒ Provides a framework for query optimization.

RA operations: select (σ), project (π), cross product (×),

union (⋃), intersection (∩), difference (−), join ( ⋈ )

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Department of CS&E, IITM
The select Operator
ƒ Unary operator.
ƒ can be used to select those tuples of a relation that
satisfy a given condition.
ƒ Notation: σθ ( r )
σ : select operator ( read as sigma)
θ : selection condition
r - relational instance
ƒ Result: a relation with the same schema as r
consisting of the tuples in r that satisfy condition θ
ƒ Select operation is commutative:
σc1 (σc2 ( r ) ) = σc2 (σc1 ( r ) )

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Department of CS&E, IITM
Selection Condition
• Select condition:
Basic condition or Composite condition
• Basic condition:
Either Ai <compOp> Aj or Ai <compOp> c
• Composite condition:
Basic conditions combined with logical operators
AND, OR and NOT appropriately.
• Notation: <compOp> : one of < , ≤ , > , ≥ , = , ≠
Ai, Aj :attributes in the scheme R of r
c: constant of appropriate data type.

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 19

Department of CS&E, IITM
Examples of select expressions
1. query 1:Obtain information about a professor with name
“giridhar”
σname = “giridhar” (professor)

2. query 2: Obtain information about professors who joined the

university between 1980 and 1985
σstartYear ≥ 1980 ^ startYear < 1985 (professor)

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 20

Department of CS&E, IITM
The project Operator
ƒ Unary operator.
ƒ Can be used to keep only the required attributes of a
relation instance and throw away others.
ƒ Notation: π A1,A2, … ,Ak (r ) where A1,A2, … ,Ak is a list L of
desired attributes in the scheme of r.
ƒ Result = { (v1,v2, … ,vk) | vi ∈ dom(Ai) , 1≤ i ≤ k and
there is some tuple t in r s.t
t.A1 = v1, t.A2 = v2, … , [Link] = vk}
ƒ If r1 = πL(r2) then scheme of r1 is L

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 21

Department of CS&E, IITM
Examples of project expressions
student
rollNo name degree year sex deptNo advisor
CS04S001 Mahesh M.S 2004 M 1 CS01
CS03S001 Rajesh M.S 2003 M 1 CS02
CS04M002 Piyush M.E 2004 M 1 CS01
ES04M001 Deepak M.E 2004 M 2 ES01
ME04M001 Lalitha M.E 2004 F 3 ME01
ME03M002 Mahesh M.S 2003 M 3 ME01

π rollNo, name (student)

πname (σdegree = “M.S” (student))
rollNo name
CS04S001 Mahesh name
CS03S001 Rajesh Mahesh

CS04M002 Piyush Rajesh

ES04M001 Deepak
note: Mahesh is displayed only once because
ME04M001 Lalitha
project operation results in a set.
ME03M002 Mahesh

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 22

Department of CS&E, IITM
Size of project expression result
ƒ If r1 = πL(r2) then scheme of r1 is L
ƒ What about the number of tuples in r1?
ƒ Two cases arise:
ƒ Projection List L contains some key of r2
ƒ Then |r1| = |r2|
ƒ Projection List L does not contain any key of r2
ƒ Then |r1| ≤ |r2|

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 23

Department of CS&E, IITM
Set Operators on Relations
• As relations are sets of tuples, set operations are applicable
to them; but not in all cases.
• Union Compatibility : Consider two schemes R1, R2 where
R1 = (A1, A2, …, Ak) ; R2 = (B1, B2, …, Bm)
• R1 and R2 are called union-compatible if
• k = m and
• dom(Ai) = dom(Bi) for 1 ≤ i ≤ k
• Set operations – union, intersection, difference
• Applicable to two relations if their schemes are
union-compatible
• If r3 = r1 ⋃ r2 , scheme of r3 is R1 (as a convention)

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 24

Department of CS&E, IITM
Set Operations
r1 - relation with scheme R1
r2 - relation with scheme R2 - union compatible with R1

r1 ⋃ r2 = {t | t ∈ r1 or t ∈ r2};
r1 ∩ r2 = {t | t ∈ r1 and t ∈ r2}
r1 − r2 = {t | t ∈ r1 and t ∉ r2};

By convention, in all the cases, the scheme of the result

is that of the first operand i.e r1.

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 25

Department of CS&E, IITM
Cross product Operation
r1 × r 2
r1 A1 A2 ... Am
a11 a12 ... a1m A1 A 2 ... A m B1 B 2 ... B n
a21 a22 ... a2 m a11 a12 ... a1 m b1 1 b1 2 ... b1 n
as1 as 2 ... asm a11 a12 ... a1 m b 21 b 2 2 ... b 2 n
. .
. .
r1 : s tuples a11 a12 ... a1 m bt 1 bt 2 ... btn
r2 B1 B2 ... Bn a 21 a 2 2 ... a 2 m b11 b12 ... b1 n
b11 b12 ... b1n a 21 a 2 2 ... a 2 m b 21 b 22 ... b 2 n
. .
b21 b22 ... b2 n . .

bt1 bt 2 ... btn a 21 a 2 2 ... a 2 m bt 1 bt 2 ... btn

.
r2 : t tuples .
.
r1 × r2 : s*t tuples
Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 26
Department of CS&E, IITM
Example Query using cross product
•Obtain the list of professors along with
the name of their departments

• profDetail (eId, pname,deptno) ← π empId, name, deptNo (professor)

• deptDetail (dId,dname) ← π deptId, name (department)

• profDept ← profDetail × deptDetail

• desiredProfDept ← σ deptno = dId (profDept)

• result ← π eld, pname, dname (desiredProfDept)

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 27

Department of CS&E, IITM
Join Operation
• Cross product : produces all combinations of tuples
• often only certain combinations are meaningful
• cross product is usually followed by selection

• Join : combines tuples from two relations provided they

satisfy a specified condition (join condition)
• equivalent to performing cross product followed by
selection
• a very useful operation

• Depending on the type of condition we have

• theta join
• equi join

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 28

Department of CS&E, IITM
Theta join
• Let r1 - relation with scheme R1 = (A1,A2,…,Am)
r2 - relation with scheme R2 = (B1,B2,…,Bn)
and R1 ∩ R2 = φ
• Notation for join expression : r1 ⋈θ r2 , θ - join condition
θ is of the form : C1 ^ C2 ^ … ^ Cs
Ci is of the form : Aj <CompOp> Bk
<CompOp> : = , ≠, < , ≤ , > , ≥
• Scheme of the result relation
Q = (A1,A2,…,Am,B1,B2,…,Bn)
• r = {(a1,a2,…,am,b1,b2,…,bn) (a1,a2,…,am) ∈ r1,
(b1,b2,…,bn) ∈ r2 and (a1,a2,…,am , b1,b2,…,bn) satisfies θ}

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 29

Department of CS&E, IITM
Professor
empId name sex startYear deptNo phone
CS01 GIRIDHAR M 1984 1 22576345

CS02 KESHAV M 1989 1 22576346

MURTHY
ES01 RAJIV GUPTHA M 1980 2 22576244

ME01 TAHIR M 1999 3 22576243

NAYYAR

Courses
Department courseId cname credits deptNo
CS635 Algorithms 3 1
deptId name hod phone
CS636 A.I 4 1
1 Computer Science CS01 22576235
ES456 D.S.P 3 2
2 Electrical Engg. ES01 22576234 ME650 Aero 3 3
Dynamics
3 Mechanical Engg. ME01 22576233

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 30

Department of CS&E, IITM
Examples
For each department, find its name and the name, sex and phone number of
the head of the department.
Prof (empId, p-name, sex, deptNo, prof-phone)
← π empId, name, sex, deptNo, phone (professor)
Result ←
π DeptId, name, hod, p-name, sex, prof-phone (Department ⋈(empId = hod) ^ (deptNo = deptId) Prof)

deptId name hod p-name sex prof-phone

1 Computer CS01 Giridher M 22576235

Science
2 Electrical EE01 Rajiv M 22576234
Engg. Guptha
3 Mechanical ME01 Tahir M 22576233
Engg. Nayyar

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 31

Department of CS&E, IITM
Equi-join and Natural join
• Equi-join : Equality is the only comparison operator used in the
join condition
• Natural join : R1, R2 - have common attributes, say X1,X2,X3
• Join condition:
(R1.X1 = R2.X1) ^ (R1.X2 = R2.X2) ^ (R1.X3 = R2.X3)
• values of common attributes should be equal
• Schema for the result Q = R1 ⋃ (R2- {X1, X2, X3 })
•Only one copy of the common attributes is kept

• Notation : r = r1 * r2

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 32

Department of CS&E, IITM
Examples – Equi-join
Find courses offered by each department

π deptId, name, courseId, cname, credits ( Department ⋈(deptId = deptNo) Courses)

deptId name courseId cname credits

1 Computer CS635 Algorithms 3

Science
1 Computer CS636 A.I 4
Science
2 Electrical ES456 D.S.P 3
Engg.
3 Mechanical ME650 Aero 3
Engg. Dynamics

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 33

Department of CS&E, IITM
 Teaching
empId courseId sem year classRoom
CS01 CS635 1 2005 BSB361
CS02 CS636 1 2005 BSB632
ES01 ES456 2 2004 ESB650
ME650 ME01 1 2004 MSB331

To find the courses handled by each professor

Professor * Teaching
result
empId name sex startYear deptNo phone courseId sem year classRoom
CS01 Giridhar M 1984 1 22576345 CS635 1 2005 BSB361

CS02 Keshav M 1989 1 22576346 CS636 1 2005 BSB632

Murthy
ES01 Rajiv M 1989 2 22576244 ES456 2 2004 ESB650
Guptha
ME01 Tahir M 1999 3 22576243 ME650 1 2004 MSB331
Nayyar

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 34

Department of CS&E, IITM
Division operator
ƒ The necessary condition to apply division operator on
instances r(R) and s(S) is S ⊆ R
ƒ The relation r ÷ s is a relation on schema R – S
A tuple t is in r ÷ s if and only if
1) t is in π R-S (r)
2) For every tuple ts in s, there is tr in r satisfying both
a) tr [S] = ts
b) tr [R – S] = t

• Another Definition
Division operator produces a relation R (X) that includes all
tuples t [X] in R1 (Z) that appear in R1 in combination with
every tuple from R2 (Y) where Z = X ⋃ Y

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 35

Department of CS&E, IITM
 S = (A, B), R = (A, B, C, D), X = (C, D)
x = r÷ s
s A B
a1 b1 r
A B C D
a 2 b2 a1 b1 c1 d1
a 2 b2 c1 d1
x a1 b1 c2 d 2
C D
c1 d 1 a1 b1 c3 d 3
c3 d 3 a 2 b2 c3 d 3

(c2, d2) is not present in the result of division as it does not appear
in combination with all the tuples of s in r

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 36

Department of CS&E, IITM
 Query using division operation

Find those students who have registered for all courses offered
in dept of Computer Science.

Step1: Get the course enrollment information for all students

studEnroll ← π name, courseId (student * enrollment)

Step2: Get the course Ids of all courses offered by CS dept

csCourse ← πcourseId(σdname = “computer science”(courses ⋈ deptId = deptNodept))

Result : studEnroll ÷ csCourse

Schema

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Department of CS&E, IITM
Suppose result of step 1 is result of step 2
studEnroll csCourse
name courseId courseId
Mahesh CS635 CS635
Mahesh CS636 CS636
Rajesh CS635
Piyush CS636
Piyush CS635
Deepak ES456
Lalitha ME650
Mahesh ME650

Let’s assume for a

studEnroll ÷ csCourse moment that student
result names are unique!
name
Mahesh
Piyush

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 38

Department of CS&E, IITM
Complete Set of Operators

• Are all Relational Algebra operators essential ?

Some operators can be realized through other operators

• What is the minimal set of operators ?

• The operators {σ , π, × , ⋃ , - }constitute a complete set
of operators
• Necessary and sufficient set of operators.
• Intersection – union and difference
• Join – cross product followed by selection

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 39

Department of CS&E, IITM
Example Queries
Retrieve the list of female PhD students

σ degree = ‘phD’ ^ sex = ‘F’ (student)

Obtain the name and rollNo of all female Btech students

π rollNo, name (σ degree = ‘BTech’ ^ sex = ‘F’ (student))

Obtain the rollNo of students who never obtained an ‘E’ grade

π rollNo (student) – π rollNo (σ grade = ‘E’ (enrollment))

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 40

Department of CS&E, IITM
More Example Queries
Obtain the department Ids for departments with no lady
professor

π deptId (dept) – π deptId (σ sex = ‘F’ (professor))

Obtain the rollNo of girl students who have obtained

at least one S grade

π rollNo (σ sex = ‘F’(student)) ∩ π rollNo (σ grade = ‘S’ (enrollment))

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 41

Department of CS&E, IITM
 Outer Join Operation (1/2)
ƒ Theta join, equi-join, natural join are all called inner joins . The
result of these operations contain only the matching tuples

ƒ The set of operations called outer joins are used when all
tuples in relation r or relation s or both in r and s have
to be in result.

There are 3 kinds of outer joins:

Left outer join

Right outer join

Full outer join

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 42

Department of CS&E, IITM
Outer Join Operation (2/2)

Left outer join: r s

It keeps all tuples in the first, or left relation r in the result. For
some tuple t in r, if no matching tuple is found in s then
S-attributes of t are made null in the result.

Right outer join: r s

Same as above but tuples in the second relation are all kept in
the result. If necessary, R-attributes are made null.

Full outer join: r s

All the tuples in both the relations r and s are in the result.

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 43

Department of CS&E, IITM
Instance Data for Examples
Student
rollNo name degree year sex deptNo advisor
CS04S001 Mahesh M.S 2004 M 1 CS01
CS05S001 Amrish M.S 2003 M 1 null
CS04M002 Piyush M.E 2004 M 1 CS01
ES04M001 Deepak M.E 2004 M 2 null
ME04M001 Lalitha M.E 2004 F 3 ME01
ME03M002 Mahesh M.S 2003 M 3 ME01

Professor
empId name sex startYear deptNo phone
CS01 GIRIDHAR M 1984 1 22576345

CS02 KESHAV M 1989 1 22576346

MURTHY
ES01 RAJIV GUPTHA M 1980 2 22576244

ME01 TAHIR M 1999 3 22576243

NAYYAR

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 44

Department of CS&E, IITM
Left outer join

temp ← (student advisor = empId

professor)

ρ rollNo, name, advisor (π rollNo, [Link], [Link] (temp))

Result rollNo name advisor

CS04S001 Mahesh Giridhar
CS05S001 Amrish Null
CS04M002 Piyush Giridhar
ES04M001 Deepak Null
ME04M001 Lalitha Tahir Nayyer
ME03M002 Mahesh Tahir Nayyer

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 45

Department of CS&E, IITM
Right outer join

temp ← (student advisor = empId

professor)

ρ rollNo, name, advisor (π rollNo, [Link], [Link] (temp))

Result rollNo name advisor

CS04S001 Mahesh Giridhar
CS04M002 Piyush Giridhar
null null Keshav Murthy
null null Rajiv Guptha
ME04M001 Lalitha Tahir Nayyer
ME03M002 Mahesh Tahir Nayyer

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 46

Department of CS&E, IITM
Full outer join

temp ← (student advisor = empId

professor)

ρ roll no, name, advisor (π roll No, [Link], [Link] (temp))

Result
rollNo name advisor
CS04S001 Mahesh Giridhar
CS04M002 Piyush Giridhar
CS05S001 Amrish Null
null null Keshav Murthy
ES04M001 Deepak Null
null null Rajiv Guptha
ME04M001 Lalitha Tahir Nayyer
ME03M002 Mahesh Tahir Nayyer

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 47

Department of CS&E, IITM
E/R diagrams to Relational Schema
ƒ E/R model and the relational model are logical representations
of real world enterprises

ƒ An E/R diagram can be converted to a collection of tables

ƒ For each entity set and relationship set in E/R diagram we can
have a corresponding relational table with the same name as
entity set / relationship set

ƒ Each table will have multiple columns whose names are obtained
from the attributes of entity types/relationship types

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 48

Department of CS&E, IITM
Relational representation of strong entity sets
ƒ Create a table Ti for each strong entity set Ei.

ƒ Include simple attributes and simple components

of composite attributes of entity set Ei as attributes of Ti.

ƒMulti-valued attributes of entities are dealt with separately.

ƒ The primary key of Ei will also be the primary key of Ti.

ƒ The primary key can be referred to by other tables via

foreign keys in them to capture relationships as we see later

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 49

Department of CS&E, IITM
Relational representation of weak entity sets
ƒ Let E' be a weak entity owned by a strong entity E

ƒ E' is converted to a table, say R'

ƒ Attributes of R' will be

ƒ Attributes of the weak entity set E' and
ƒ Primary key attributes of the identifying strong entity E
• These attributes will also be a foreign key in R' referring
to the table corresponding to E

ƒMulti-valued attributes are dealt separately as described later

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Department of CS&E, IITM
Example
SectionNo Year
Name Credits RoomNo
CourseID
has Professor
Course Section
Section

Corresponding tables are

course section
courseId name credits sectionNo courseId year roomNo professor

Primary key of section = {courseId, SectionNo}

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Department of CS&E, IITM
Relational representation of multi-valued attributes
ƒ One table for each multi-valued attribute

ƒ One column for this attribute and

ƒ One column for the primary key attribute of entity / relationship

set to which this is an attribute.
e.g.,
student mailIds
Name rollNo name emailId RollNo
RollNo EmailId

Student

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 52

Department of CS&E, IITM
Handling Binary 1:1 relationship
ƒ Let S and T be entity sets in relationship R and S', T' be the
tables corresponding to these entity sets

ƒ Choose an entity set which has total participation if there is

one (says, S)

ƒ Include the primary key of T' as a foreign key of S'

ƒ Include all simple attributes of R as attributes of S'

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 53

Department of CS&E, IITM
Example
HostelName
RollNo Address
Name
1 1 Hostel RoomNo
STUDENT resides
In Room

Note: Assuming every student resides in hostel.

S-STUDENT R-residesIn T-Hostel Room

Student Hostel
RollNo Name Address RoomNo RoomNo HostelName

Foreign key name need

not be same as primary key
of the other relation

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 54

Department of CS&E, IITM
Handling 1:N Relationship
ƒ Let S be the participating entity on the N-side and T the other
entity. Let S' and T' be the corresponding tables.

ƒ Include primary key of T' as foreign key in S'

ƒ Include any simple attribute (or simple components of

composite attributes) of 1:N relation type as attributes of S'

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 55

Department of CS&E, IITM
Example
Name
Phone ProfID RollNo
Name

Professor 1 guides N Student

Student Professor
Name RollNo ProfId ProfId Name phone

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Department of CS&E, IITM
Handling M:N relationship
ƒ Make a separate table T for this Relationship R between entity
sets E1 and E2. Let R1 and R2 be the tables corresponding to
E1 and E2.

ƒ Include primary key attributes of R1 and R2 as foreign keys

in T. Their combination is the primary key in T.

M N
E1 R E2

R1 T R2
PK1 FK1 FK2 PK2

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 57

Department of CS&E, IITM
Example
Name
Name CourseID
RollNo

Student M enrolls N Course

student enrollment course

name rollNo rollNo courseId name courseID

Primary key of enrollment table is {RollNo, CourseID}

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 58

Department of CS&E, IITM
Handling Recursive relationships
ƒ Make a table T for the participating entity set E
( this might already be existing)
and one table for recursive relationship R.

CourseTable
Example
M is N CourseID Credits Timing
PreReq
Of

Course PreRequisiteTable
Timing
CourseID PreRequisiteOf
CourseID
Credits

Prof P Sreenivasa Kumar 59

Department of CS&E, IITM