Case Study: Scenario - Global Trading PLC Global Trading PLC is a mail order company that operates a number of different catalogues. Each catalogue addresses a specific market segment and the company is noticing a drop of in the sales through its higher end products and socio - economic customer group, typified by its 'life style' catalogue offerings. Research has shown that this is because these groupings are now typically buying from companies offering similar services and products on the World Wide Web. Whilst Global recognise the need to maintain its more traditional agent based catalogue business, they have now decided that they need to embrace e-commerce and develop a Web based service. The Finance Director has a PC at home and has recently bought Dreamweaver. The existing database system, which has built up piecemeal over a number of years, has been poorly designed and is inadequate. This new development gives the company the opportunity to redesign their system. It must be recognised that the 'traditional' business will continue for some years and that data stored for that may differ from that needed by the web based business. For example, the agent based catalogue customers must buy through the agent. Indeed, they are identified by a combination of their customer number and the agent ID. This style of catalogue maintains the traditional periodic payments system, so customer records need to include credit rating and transaction history data. By contrast, the 'life style' catalogue customers mostly pay by using credit cards, a system which is used by the vast majority of e-commerce transactions. Information is maintained for customers so that marketing mailing can be targeted. It has been recognised that an individual could be both a credit card customer AND an agent supported customer. This currently leads to duplication of data storage and mailing, some of which can be contradictory and confusing. The company headquarters are in Leeds with depots in strategic regional locations from where the company’s own fleet of delivery vans operate. Large regions can have more than one depot. There is a central depot near Birmingham that supplies the regional depots. The structure of the Agents Organisation is as follows: General Sales Manager Midland Northern Southern Scottish Division Division Division Division Each division is split into a number of regions. Each region has a number of agents, working on commission based on sales to their customers, who promote goods and take customer orders. A monthly report of the orders taken by product, with summaries at all levels of the Sales Organisation is produced for management. Sales statistics are required for each product category to monitor the effectiveness of different discount strategies. Orders are received form their customers by agents, summarised and posted to head office over night. The orders are then validated, priced and checked centrally for availabil ...

1. Case Study: Scenario - Global Trading PLC
Global Trading PLC is a mail order company that operates a
number of different catalogues. Each catalogue addresses a
specific market segment and the company is noticing a drop of
in the sales through its higher end products and socio -
economic customer group, typified by its 'life style' catalogue
offerings.
Research has shown that this is because these groupings are now
typically buying from companies offering similar services and
products on the World Wide Web.
Whilst Global recognise the need to maintain its more
traditional agent based catalogue business, they have now
decided that they need to embrace e-commerce and develop a
Web based service. The Finance Director has a PC at home and
has recently bought Dreamweaver.
The existing database system, which has built up piecemeal over
a number of years, has been poorly designed and is inadequate.
This new development gives the company the opportunity to
redesign their system.
It must be recognised that the 'traditional' business will
continue for some years and that data stored for that may differ
from that needed by the web based business. For example, the
agent based catalogue customers must buy through the agent.
Indeed, they are identified by a combination of their customer
number and the agent ID. This style of catalogue maintains the
traditional periodic payments system, so customer records need
to include credit rating and transaction history data. By
contrast, the 'life style' catalogue customers mostly pay by
using credit cards, a system which is used by the vast majority

2. of e-commerce transactions.
Information is maintained for customers so that marketing
mailing can be targeted. It has been recognised that an
individual could be both a credit card customer AND an agent
supported customer. This currently leads to duplication of data
storage and mailing, some of which can be contradictory and
confusing.
The company headquarters are in Leeds with depots in strategic
regional locations from where the company’s own fleet of
delivery vans operate. Large regions can have more than one
depot. There is a central depot near Birmingham that supplies
the regional depots.
The structure of the Agents Organisation is as follows:
General Sales Manager
Midland Northern Southern Scottish
Division Division Division
Division
Each division is split into a number of regions.
Each region has a number of agents, working on commission
based on sales to their customers, who promote goods and take
customer orders. A monthly report of the orders taken by
product, with summaries at all levels of the Sales Organisation
is produced for management. Sales statistics are required for
each product category to monitor the effectiveness of different
discount strategies.
Orders are received form their customers by agents, summarised

3. and posted to head office over night. The orders are then
validated, priced and checked centrally for availability at the
appropriate depots. Each depot services customers according to
their Agents ID. Stocks may be transferred between depots to
satisfy incoming orders – this practice, however, is not
approved of by the accounts department, but is carried out so
that part orders can be shipped, so that customer deliveries are
not delayed.
Each week, estimates produced by the Head Office are used to
update a three-month sales forecast, which shows expected sales
of each product in each of the following thirteen weeks. The
forecast is used as the basis for ordering stock which may be
ordered from a number of possible suppliers, each having
quoted a unique lead time and price. A purchase order sent to a
supplier may be for several different products, each due for
delivery in a different week. Price and lead-time quotations are
updated from time to time from suppliers’ revised quotes.
Purchase orders are placed at the price prevailing at the time of
order.
Pricing and Availability consists of:
Identifying/validating customer codes,
Identifying/validating product numbers,
Placing sales orders and order items on files,
Pricing each order item,
Checking product stock at depots and allocating if available.
This process is confused by the fact that, for historical reasons,
each depot maintains its own stock location codes, which means
that these can be duplicated.
Discount structures are based on the product categories,
examples of which are :-
Clothing - Male
Clothing - Female
Household electrical

4. Toys
Communications
The discount categories are used as follows
A : Discount given to agents
B : Additional discount given to agents who achieve sales
thresholds. These thresholds vary.
C : Used for targeted discounting for old stock
D : Used for targeted discounting for regional promotions.
Invoices are produced daily for from the details of
consignments shipped. They are posted to the Invoice History
file and copies are sent to the customers. When payments are
received these are also posted to the above file. Customer
balances are maintained. Credit notes for faulty goods or short
deliveries are generated where necessary and sent to the
customer.
The company’s current order processing system operates on a
centralised computer. In the two years since purchasing this
machine several new systems have been designed and
implemented. These include a monthly and industrial payroll
system, several accounting systems, and a sophisticated sales
product costing system.
Volumes and Frequencies (statistics are only currently known
for traditional business)
· Customers 125,000
· New Customers 150 per month
· Deleted Customers 140 per month
· Products 1,000
· Orders 5,000 per day ave.
(80% are for 20% of product codes)
· Items per Agent order 10 ave.
(10% less then 10,
10% more then 10)
· Invoices/credit notes 5,125 per day avg.
· Cash items daily 2,000 ave.
· Products that have pending orders 10% ave.

5. At any time (ALL depots will have Pending orders)
Current Head Office enquiry screens include:
Customer order
Customer
Assignment Overview
You will be undertaking a database development project for a
client (in this case your tutor) presenting the findings of the
analysis stage, based on the given requirements. Using feedback
from this stage you will go on to design, implement and test
your system using appropriate database techniques and
technologies. You will also be expected to evaluate your
development processes relating to the System Development Life
Cycle, as well as considering emerging technologies that could
be used to improve the organisation’s data management and
decision making processes.
Database Design
· Produce an Extended Entity Relationship Model (EERM) using
top-down approach for the given case study organisation. Use
QSEE to produce your EERD and the notation taught on the
module. List Validation Questions (6-10) used to validate your
EER Diagram.
· Normalise the Form in Appendix 3 (apply bottom- up
approach)
· (Use the pro-forma given in Appendix 2)
· Produce a Composite EER Diagram (based on outputs from
bottom up and top down approaches) and derive this Composite
EERD to produce final list of relations/tables and for each
relation/table produce a full list of attributes, attribute
definition and occurrences (data values), clearly defining
attributes that are Primary Key(s) and any derived Foreign
Key(s) attributes.
Implementation and Testing

6. You are required to implement only a sub-system of the
produced Composite model in previous task.
You will be asked to demonstrate your implemented and tested
sub-system.
· Tables and DataImplementation in Apex using SQL Script
environment
The Implementation of a sub-system (4-6 related tables).
As a guideline you should populate each table with at least 10
rows. The data should be designed to provide appropriate
results from the queries, and should reflect the requirements of
the organisation.
· SQL queries (min of 5 to be produced)
To test your system, you are asked to produce a set of queries
which will be specified in plain English (business statement)
and implemented using SQL statements. Your SQL statements
will need to be complex in order to achieve high marks.
· Import your Apex tables into SAS Enterprise guide and
· Produce 3 programs to manipulate data using SAS programing
· produce 3 reports using SAS program
Appendix 3: Normalisation Template (proforma)
UNF
1. List all
Attributes from document/table.
2. Identify key field
underlined or in bold.(May need an artificial key)
3. Put repeating groups in (….)*
1NF
1. Break out repeated group(s) if any to form new group.
2. Include original key as a foreign key in new group.
3. Identify additional column(s) in new group to form compound
key including foreign key.

7. 2NF
1. Break out any part key dependencies.
2. Identify keys for each new group and include any foreign key
links to link back to original group.
3NF
1. Further data groups created by breaking out any non-key
dependencies.
2. All groups have a key and foreign key links shown.
Table /
Relation

8. Appendix 3: Normalisation Form (using bottom up approach)
List al attributes, and normalise as one single task
Customer Order Enquiry Screen
Order no. 287614
Customer no. 147922
Agent ID S231
Date received 7.10.00
Due date 31.10.00
Items outstanding 2
Special instructions
Delivery must not be made on
Tuesday and Thursday afternoons
Product
Code
Quantity
Discounted
Price
Date
Sent
149714

9. 2
27.95
25.10.00
292812
1
39.99
25.10.00
601642
2
15.99
-
Product Enquiry Screen
Product Code N123za Date Added
Product Description Nookia Phone
STD Weight (grammes)
Code Description
Bundle/Associated n123za1 Battery
n123za2 Handset
n123za3 SIM Card Pay2Go
n123za4 SIM Card Contract
Packing Type
Mailing Code
Unit Price
VAT Class
Discount Code a : 10%
b :5%

10. c :10%
d :15%
Depot No.
Stock Location No.
Quantity in Stock
Daily Usage
Re-order level
Maximum stock level
Valuation
Customer History Screen
Customer No. S231-147922
Customer Name ____________
Agent Name ____________
Credit Limit £ 500.00
Balance £ 472.16
Date
Reference
Debit (£)
Credit (£)
Trans Type *

11. 2.2.00
414292
250.00
-
INV
5.3.00
524293
-
250.00
CN
12.3.00
534596
252.70
-
INV
6.4.00
604692
-
25.27
PMT
6.4.00
609211
300.00
-
INV
9.5.00
736244
-
55.27

12. PMT
* Key
INV - Invoice
CN - Credit Note
PMT - Payment