User Manual

Comprehensive guide for ERD Architect Data Modeler 2022.

Introduction

ERD Architect Data Modeler helps organizations to visualize and understand the structure of information involved in the business. It differentiates business and technical requirements, describing them in a way consumable to both technical and business users.

It helps engineering teams build quality software with clarity and conviction, eliminating significant re-work and miscommunications.

Data Modeling

Data modeling is a set of techniques to analyze and define data requirements. ERD Architect supports Entity Relationship Modeling using IE (Information Engineering) Notation.

Entities & Attributes

Entities are significant "things" in the business environment (people, places, activities). In a relational database, these become tables.

Attributes describe entities. They represent structural or behavioral characteristics and become columns in a database.

Tip: Press Ctrl+E to create an entity. Press F3 to add attributes.

Relationships

Relationships represent associations among entities. ERD Architect supports several types:

Identifying vs. Non-Identifying

  • Identifying (Solid Line): Child entity depends on the parent for identity. Parent primary key becomes part of child primary key.
  • Non-Identifying (Dashed Line): Child entity exists independently. Parent key is a simple foreign key.

Other Relationship Types

  • Many-to-Many: Automatically resolved into an association table with two one-to-many relationships.
  • Recursive: A relationship between two instances of the same entity (e.g., Employee and Supervisor).
  • Subtype (Is-A): Represents inheritance. Super-types share common attributes, while Sub-types have specific ones.

Keys & Domains

Keys

Keys uniquely identify records. Types supported:

  • Primary Key: Unique identifier, no nulls.
  • Unique Key: Unique values, allows one null.
  • Foreign Key: Refers to a key in another table.
  • Composite Key: Key with multiple attributes.

Domains

Domains define reusable data types, lengths, and constraints. Applying domains standardizes data characteristics across the model.

User Interface

The workspace consists of:

  • Object Explorer: Hierarchical view of all objects.
  • Diagram Area: Visual modeling canvas.
  • Properties Window: Edit details of selected objects.
  • Output SQL: View instant DDL for selected objects.

Engineering Features

Forward Engineering

Build a database from your model. Includes Instant DDL for quick generation and DDL Workbench for executing scripts against a connected database.

Reverse Engineering

Import schema from existing databases (SQL Server, MySQL, Snowflake). Visualize existing structures and perform analysis.

Schema Compare

Compare two models or a model and a database. View differences in a side-by-side tree and generate synchronization scripts.

Reports

Generate documentation in HTML or CSV formats. Reports can include diagrams and detailed metadata, perfect for peer reviews and offline documentation.