Entities and relationships

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Entities and relationships

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comandant005

Posted Wednesday, February 23, 2011 5:21 PM

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Hi there,

I am a computing student and I am currently working on designing a database system for a charity organisation. Unfortunately, I am having some difficulties and my problems will be best answered if I give the specifications.

I have identified some entities and relationship from the specification but i'm not certain that i am in the right direction. My entities include; Contributor, Donator, Volunteer, Person, Founder, Governor, Beneficiary institute, Sponsor.

It will be very much appreciated if you can help me check to see that I have the right entities and disclose any missing ones. I will also like to know the relationship between the attributes.

Specifications
GTH is a non-political and non-profit organisation that co-ordinates people’s donations of various
types around the world and it is based in the UK (at present). It does not discriminate among
various ethnic groups neither is it influenced by any geographical factors.
The collected money and any other donations are distributed among various organisations and
voluntary bodies on request.
You are to undertake this assignment individually, although you may discuss ideas with your fellow
students. However, the final submission must be your own work.
Where information is not available you should make reasonable assumptions. Make sure that you
include all business constraints that have been captured during the analysis part.
Specification
The Director of GTH requires you to design a database system to assist with the
administration of the office. The requirements collection and analysis phase of the
database design process, which is based on the Manager’s view, has provided the
following requirements specification for the GTH database system.
The donations are collected in two ways from people. Hence, we classified the people
according to their donations. For the purpose of this coursework, the following
definitions apply:
1. A “Donator”, refers to a person who donates money or equivalent items (e.g.
gold, shares, properties, etc).
2. A “Volunteer” refers to unpaid helper who voluntary provide his/her service
free of charge (e.g. professional people such as Physicians, Engineers,
Lecturers, etc.) or assist in certain activities.
3. A “Contributor” refers to a person who can be a Donator, Volunteer or both.
Each month a record of the actual total hours spent by a Volunteer is recorded.
Labour hours are evaluated later in money by multiplying the monthly total hours by a
suitable rate depending on the Volunteer profession.
A record of each Contributor’s donation preferences must be kept. This is used to
direct the donation to the favourite charity or institute at the Contributors’ wish.
These preferences are restricted by the following categories: Religious Assistance,
Natural Disaster, Health Care, Family Care, Humanitarian Aid and Cultural Care. A
Contributor can have at most one corresponding address when it is different from
his/her usual address. Comp1302 Cswk_DBD_G&T_Charity_May 11_V1.docx Page 3 of 7 printed on 18-Jan-11
Money contribution from a Donator must be all paid in one method only at any one
time. However, a Donator can change his method of payment from one time to
another. It can be Cash, Cheque, Bank Draft, Standing Order, or others. Non money
payment by a Donator can be Shares, Property, Food, Clothes, Medicine and Bedding.
One of the most important activities of a Volunteer is to persuade candidate
Donators to give their donations. A Volunteer is responsible for communicating with
many Donators that are allocated to him. No other Volunteer is allowed to
communicate unless he is doing it on behalf of the main allocated Volunteer. Changing
the allocated Volunteer is allowed but must be recorded. A Donator can only be
approached by one Volunteer at one time. A record of the date of the last Donator
contact and with whom it was made must be stored in the DB.
Initially there was a plan to keep details of all founders of the GTH, but recently it
has realised that the list of Governors of GTH would be more useful. The information
should include each governor’s starting and finishing dates.
The term Administrator is used to anyone works at the GTH (voluntary or paid).
Some details on each administrator are to be kept. This includes name, address,
contact numbers, type of contract, salary or hourly rate, as well as the position each
occupies (e.g. a member, president), etc.
A person can be a Founder, Governor, Administrator or any combination of the above.
There is a high chance that any of these people become Donator (donates money or
others) or Volunteer (labour participant in voluntary activities).
Contributions (money or otherwise) are to be delivered to Beneficiary Institutes.
Information is to be kept on each institute such as the name of the institute, contact
name and address, name of any sponsors or caretakers, last annual spending budget
(usually of the previous financial year). The DB also should hold information or brief
descriptions of any future activities that a beneficiary institute is planning to engage
in and awaiting sponsorship. The category of each activity is also classified in the
same way as the donators’ preference categories above.
A sponsor or a caretaker of a beneficiary institute can be of one type. These include
Religious Authority, Government Organisation, International Organisation,
professional Society, Personal or Family. A beneficiary institute can have at most one
corresponding address when it is different from its usual address. An institute can
share an address, phone and fax with another institute.

Thanks in advance

Post #1068608

LutzM

Posted Thursday, February 24, 2011 2:59 PM

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Last Login: Wednesday, April 24, 2013 3:17 PM
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Since you decided to double post, here's a copy of my reply, still awaiting your reply (on either thread).

LutzM (2/24/2011)

David,

dont' you see some kind of a contradiction when reading the following two statements?

"I will be very much grateful if you can help solve this problem of mine."
vs.
"You are to undertake this assignment individually, ... However, the final submission must be your own work."

If you have some spare time I strongly recommend to look up the words "plagiarism" and "copyright".

What I'd really like to know: What is your intention to ask someone else to do your (home)work even if you're asked to provide your own solution?
How much do you respect a result someone else came up with (not limited to the given situation)? Do you immediately "sell" it as your own work?

Please share your motivation.

Lutz
A pessimist is an optimist with experience.

How to get fast answers to your question
How to post performance related questions
Links for Tally Table , Cross Tabs and Dynamic Cross Tabs , Delimited Split Function

Post #1069326

PaulB-TheOneAndOnly

Posted Friday, February 25, 2011 2:16 PM

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Group: General Forum Members
Last Login: Yesterday @ 3:12 PM
Points: 2,988, Visits: 4,409

I think you have to read again the specs... specially the part that clearly reads "You are to undertake this assignment individually, although you may discuss ideas with your fellow students. However, the final submission must be your own work"

So, if you have an specific - conceptual question feel free to ask.

_____________________________________
Pablo (Paul) Berzukov

Author of Understanding Database Administration available at Amazon and other bookstores.

Disclaimer: Advice is provided to the best of my knowledge but no implicit or explicit warranties are provided. Since the advisor explicitly encourages testing any and all suggestions on a test non-production environment advisor should not held liable or responsible for any actions taken based on the given advice.

Post #1069866

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