As an independent consultant, you have a contract with a university to develop an application to support course administration. Read the detailed description of this application and then complete the tasks that follow.

A course has a unique course number and title and is assigned to one or more areas of the Computer Science program. Each course has an instructor, at least one teaching or research assistant, an online discussion forum, a delivery period (start date, end date), and a capacity (maximum number of participants). A course need not be offered each term, but the challenge option is open throughout the entire year. A course may have prerequisite courses, and a student is not allowed to register for a course if they have not fulfilled the prerequisites or their equivalent. In addition, a student who would like to challenge a course should have the course prerequisites or authorization from the course instructor.

An instructor has an employee number, first name, last name, email, phone number, and address and is assigned to several areas of expertise. Note that two different instructors may have the same (first and last) names. Also, instructors may share the same address (e.g., partners living in the same house). Each instructor may have dependents. Each dependent has a first name, last name, gender, and date of birth.

A student is given a unique student number. The first name and last name, email, phone number, address, and GPA must be recorded for each student. Identical names and addresses may belong to different individuals. A student may be enrolled in several courses each term. The grade must be recorded for each enrollment. There are two types of students: graduate and undergraduate. Undergraduate students have a study major, while graduate students have both a specialization and a thesis topic.

A teaching assistant is a graduate student. Their first name, last name, year, and GPA must be recorded, as well as the number of courses (including the current ones) the teaching assistant has already taught.

A research assistant is a student (graduate or undergraduate). In addition to the basic information recorded for a student, the number of years of work experience must be recorded. The research assistant provides laboratory support for students, manages the course discussion forum, and does some programming tasks.

An area of study is described by its name. An area may be divided into several sub-areas. These areas are used to categorize instructors as well as courses. For example, the area of game development consists of sub-areas such as Graphics, Networking, and Human–Computer Interaction; the area of Data Science consists of Databases, Data Mining, Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning.

For each relation without a unique attribute or combination of attributes, introducing an artificial primary key might be a good idea.

Design an EER diagram for this course administration system. Draw the complete EER diagram, including all aspects discussed in the course. Clearly state any further assumptions made, but keep in mind that you must not override the specifications above.

Identify and list weak entities and associative entities.

For every supertype/subtype relationship, identify the subtype discriminator and list any eventual disjointness constraint as well as any disjoint rule or overlap rule associated with it

Question

As an independent consultant, you have a contract with a university to develop an application to support course administration. Read the detailed description of this application and then complete the tasks that follow.

A course has a unique course number and title and is assigned to one or more areas of the Computer Science program. Each course has an instructor, at least one teaching or research assistant, an online discussion forum, a delivery period (start date, end date), and a capacity (maximum number of participants). A course need not be offered each term, but the challenge option is open throughout the entire year. A course may have prerequisite courses, and a student is not allowed to register for a course if they have not fulfilled the prerequisites or their equivalent. In addition, a student who would like to challenge a course should have the course prerequisites or authorization from the course instructor.
An instructor has an employee number, first name, last name, email, phone number, and address and is assigned to several areas of expertise. Note that two different instructors may have the same (first and last) names. Also, instructors may share the same address (e.g., partners living in the same house). Each instructor may have dependents. Each dependent has a first name, last name, gender, and date of birth.
A student is given a unique student number. The first name and last name, email, phone number, address, and GPA must be recorded for each student. Identical names and addresses may belong to different individuals. A student may be enrolled in several courses each term. The grade must be recorded for each enrollment. There are two types of students: graduate and undergraduate. Undergraduate students have a study major, while graduate students have both a specialization and a thesis topic.
A teaching assistant is a graduate student. Their first name, last name, year, and GPA must be recorded, as well as the number of courses (including the current ones) the teaching assistant has already taught.
A research assistant is a student (graduate or undergraduate). In addition to the basic information recorded for a student, the number of years of work experience must be recorded. The research assistant provides laboratory support for students, manages the course discussion forum, and does some programming tasks.
An area of study is described by its name. An area may be divided into several sub-areas. These areas are used to categorize instructors as well as courses. For example, the area of game development consists of sub-areas such as Graphics, Networking, and Human–Computer Interaction; the area of Data Science consists of Databases, Data Mining, Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning.

For each relation without a unique attribute or combination of attributes, introducing an artificial primary key might be a good idea.

Design an EER diagram for this course administration system. Draw the complete EER diagram, including all aspects discussed in the course. Clearly state any further assumptions made, but keep in mind that you must not override the specifications above.
Identify and list weak entities and associative entities.
For every supertype/subtype relationship, identify the subtype discriminator and list any eventual disjointness constraint as well as any disjoint rule or overlap rule associated with it

Accepted Answer

The information given is to develop an application to support course administration by using EER…

Identify and list weak entities and associative entities. For every supertype/subtype relationship, identify the subtype discriminator and list any eventual disjointness constraint as well as any disjoint rule or overlap rule associated with it