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Subject:Re: How do you illustrate a database? From:Yvonne deGraw <yvonne -at- SHARK -dot- SMARTSTAR -dot- COM> Date:Thu, 2 Dec 1993 08:56:18 -0800
Ken d'Albenas asks:
Ken d'Albenas asks:
> How do people depict a database in diagrams?
We document relational databases for a programmer/application developer
audience. We use the "disk/drum" cartoon mainly because that is what you
see in illustrations in the trade press (the magazines our audience gets
for free by lying in a questionnaire about how much software/hardware they
plan to buy).
Lately, I've been feeling that that depiction is a bit outdated, since
there are gigabyte drives in much smaller packages. But, stacks of paper
and file cabinets don't hold up as a metaphor for relational databases
and our audience would probably find them "too cute".
In sections where we want to show the contents of a database, we use a
variation of an "entity-relationship" diagram -- a common way of
diagramming relational databases. There are several other ways of diagramming
relational databases. You can probably find books on "CASE tools" that
describe the various diagramming styles.
