Hi guys,

I have to create a database in Access and I desperately need some help.

One of the things I need the database to store is general information about technicians, (things like name address, telephone etc) that's quite easy to do.

However I also need to store the following information about technicians:

Qualification level- assume that there are 5 levels of training technicians receive and a corresponding qualification for each. So a technician does a training course and then at a later date does an exam which they either pass or fail. In terms of storing data, the technician can take the course and the exam (or the exam without the course) as many times as they like. Level 1 is the basic training. Also, there are new models course which they have to take regularly. However, there are no exams for it.

To store all this I was thinking about creating 3 tables.

1st Table: Qualification Exam
QualExamID#
TechnicianID - (foreign key from technician table)
Level
ExamDate
Result

2nd table: Qualification Course
QualificationCourseID#
TechnicianID foreign key
CourseDate
Level
QualificationExamID

New Models Course table
NewModelsID#
TechnicianID foreign key
CourseCode
Date

In my ERD, I have only one qualification entity and that creates problems when I have to write the attributes for it. Should the relationship between technician and qualificiation be many to many or 1 to many?


Is there a better/more efficient way of doing this? Any suggestions?

I don't really know how to explain myself clearly so I'm attaching the exact question we received.

Thanks !

Fred

i don't think so

I updated my question!

Still looking for help,

thanks!

attaching the actual homework assignment isn't going to help us help you

we're not going to do the assignment for you

please try to ask a ~specific~ question, and do not ask us read that monolithic piece of crap (your instructors should be shot, by the way)

My question is it correct for one entity, in this case Qualification, to have two tables?

At the moment I have one Qualification entity but two tables about it "new course" and "Qualification".

Because apparently there is a way I can combine the new models table and qualification table in one. But I just can't see how to do that without having blank spaces in my database...

in general, yes

however, if there are two tables, and the relationship isn't exactly one-to-zero-or-one, then chances are you should have had two entities

i say "should have had" because splitting an entity into two tables is only done during the physical design stage of database development, by the way -- long after the logical design is completed

during the logical design stage, which involves entity-relationship diagrams, there is no such thing as a table, and all keys are natural keys