Skip to content

Edit a Data Model ER Diagram

The bulk of the editing of a data model is performed in the ER diagram.

Steps

  1. Sign in as a user with at least the Metadata Editor capability object role assignment on the data model in which you are interested.

  2. Navigate to the object page for the data model on which you wish to edit a diagram.

  3. Click though the folder structure until you arrive at the diagram you wish to edit.

  4. Click to open the diagram

  5. Click START EDITING.

  6. Refer to the data modeling common features for us of the non-editing portion of the UI.

  7. The drag and drop objects from panel on the left. It has a Search and a Browse tab and is restricted to the Model Scope defined for the data model. There are preferences for how one may see the hierarchy and also how to apply the search text, just as with the filter panel in the main search.

  8. Click New (plus sign) to add:

    • A New shape

    • A New relationship.

  9. Click STOP EDITING to leave the edit mode. You will have a chance to confirm any changes.

  10. Click SAVE to save any changes but still remain in edit mode.

Example

Navigate to the object page for the Staging DW database model and click the ER Diagrams tab.

Click to CREATE the Employee diagram.

Click to open the Employee data model diagram. Click START EDITING.

All the files and fields in the Model scope for this data model are presented in a browse panel on the left.

Right-click on one of the four selected models and select Add to diagram.

The entity relationship we added earlier is already included as both end points are included.

Expand the Person folder in the Explorer panel on the left and drag BusinessEntity.csv into the diagram.

BusinessEntity.csv is now included in the diagram.

Create and Edit a Data Model relationship from the ER Diagram

Continuing from Edit a Data Model ER Diagram.

Click New (plus sign icon) > Entity Relationship.

Drag the BusinessEntitiy.csv file into the EmployeeDepartmentHistory.csv file and select Entity Relationship under BINARY RELATIONSHIPS.

Select Entity Relationship.

Pick the Data Lake Data Model as the place to put the entity relationship being created.

Enter the values of the fields as above and click OK.

A relationship must exist in some model. In this case, we already have a parent folder to place it in.

The new entity relationship is defined.

Click SAVE to save our progress, then click Auto Layout and select Orthogonal to clean up the diagram.

When editing you may use the Undo to revert back to the diagram before layout.

A screenshot of a computer AI-generated content may be incorrect.

There are several options for presentation and layout based upon structure, methodology and other algorithms.

Drag JobCandidate.csv up to the upper left and click Fit to content to resize to fit.

Now, we can also simply import relationships already defined between an object in the diagram and other objects either in the diagram or not.

Click STOP EDITING and then click SAVE to save the diagram and then right-click BusinessEntity.csv and select Open and go to the Relationships tab.

There are several relationships which have been defined for BusinessEntity.csv.

  • An entity relationship to EmployeeDepartmentHistory.csv which we created earlier via this diagram and data model.

  • A data flow classifier map to Vendor which is part of the data mapping model Data Lake to Staging.

  • A reference in the Data Lake multi-model tree structure.

You can add these other relationships defined in different ways to the diagram. Be sure you are editing the diagram and right-click the BusinessEntity.csv file and select to Import related objects and relationships. Then click Auto layout again and select Orthogonal or whatever looks best.

Probably we can drop the reference link to the shortcut to BusinesEntity.csv. Please do and click Auto layout and select what looks best.

We now have a diagram with new relationships imported.

Data Model Diagram Visualization

These features work as documented for imported data model diagrams.

Interpreting the graphical diagram

A diagram of a model Description automatically generated with medium confidence