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General Datawarehousing Interview Questions and Answers (7)

What is ER Diagram?

The Entity-Relationship (ER) model was originally proposed by Peter in 1976 [Chen76] as a way to unify the network and relational database views.

Simply stated the ER model is a conceptual data model that views the real world as entities and relationships. A basic component of the model is the Entity-Relationship diagram which is used to visually represents data objects.

Since Chen wrote his paper the model has been extended and today it is commonly used for database design For the database designer, the utility of the ER model is:

it maps well to the relational model. The constructs used in the ER model can easily be transformed into relational tables. it is simple and easy to understand with a minimum of training. Therefore, the model can be used by the database designer to communicate the design to the end user.

In addition, the model can be used as a design plan by the database developer to implement a data model in a specific database management software.

Which columns go to the fact table and which columns go the dimension table?

The Primary Key columns of the Tables(Entities) go to the Dimension Tables as Foreign Keys.
The Primary Key columns of the Dimension Tables go to the Fact Tables as Foreign Keys.

What are modeling tools available in the Market?

here are a number of data modeling tools

Tool Name Company Name
Erwin Computer Associates
Embarcadero Embarcadero Technologies
Rational Rose IBM Corporation
Power Designer Sybase Corporation
Oracle Designer Oracle Corporation

Name some of modeling tools available in the Market?

These tools are used for Data/dimension modeling

1. Oracle Designer
2. ERWin (Entity Relationship for windows)
3. Informatica (Cubes/Dimensions)
4. Embarcadero
5. Power Designer Sybase

How do you load the time dimension?

Time dimensions are usually loaded by a program that loops through all possible dates that may appear in the data. It is not unusual for 100 years to be represented in a time dimension, with one row per day.

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