2.5. Graphs and Schemas
Systems analysts love to draw diagrams. The virtue of diagrams is that they appeal to the eye. Because of the way the brain processes visual information, it is usually easier to assimilate the information they display than the same information given in algebraic or tabular form. Even so, diagrams are only useful when they are simple. An attempt to make a diagram useful for more than one purpose can sometimes make it useful for no purpose at all.
Many diagrams are actually mathematical objects called graphs or schemas .14 A graph is a diagram that defines a relation. A schema shows a meta-relation: a relationship between relations.
2.5.1. Graphs
Most of us should be familiar with the idea of a graph that shows a relation between ...
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