Dr.

C K Lok
IIMT3602

IIMT3602
Information Systems Analysis and Design

Information Systems Analysis (III) –

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

Data Flow Diagrams

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 Dr. C K Lok
Learning Objectives
Understand the logical modeling of processes by studying examples of data
flow diagrams (DFDs).

Draw data flow diagrams following specific rules and guidelines that lead to
accurate and well-structured process models.

Decompose data flow diagrams into lower-level diagrams.

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

Balance higher-level and lower-level data flow diagrams.

Use data flow diagrams as a tool to support the analysis of information

systems.

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 Dr. C K Lok
Hands-on Experience in DFDs

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

DFDs are built by software Extensive experience in
tools lab sessions

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 Dr. C K Lok
Use Cases and DFDs

Data Flow Diagram (DFD) fragments are built

for Use Cases and combined to form a DFD

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

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 Dr. C K Lok
Process Modeling (Cont.)
graphically the processes that capture, manipulate, store,
Represent and distribute data between a system and its environment
and among system components.

Utilize information gathered during requirements determination.

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

Model processes and data structures.

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 Dr. C K Lok
Data Flow Diagramming
Mechanics

Represent both physical and logical information systems

Only four symbols are used

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

Useful for depicting purely logical information flows

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 Dr. C K Lok
Definitions and Symbols
• Comparison of DeMarco
and Yourdon and Gane
and Sarson DFD symbol
sets
• Simply two different
flavors of symbol notation
• Either one is good
enough as long as they

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

are not mixed
• Lectures will adopt Gane
and Sarson

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 Dr. C K Lok
Definitions and Symbols (Cont.)
Process: work or actions
performed on data
(inside the system)

Data store: data at rest

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

(inside the system)

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 Dr. C K Lok
Definitions and Symbols (Cont.)

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

Source/sink: external entity that Data flow: arrows depicting
is the origin or destination of data movement of data
(outside the system)

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 Dr. C K Lok
Developing DFDs
Context diagram is an overview of
an organizational system that shows:
• the system boundaries.
• external entities that interact with the system.
• major information flows between the entities
and the system.

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

Note: only one process symbol, and
no data stores shown

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 Dr. C K Lok
Context Diagram

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

Context diagram of Hoosier Burger’s food-ordering system

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 Uber
Context Diagram Example -

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HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics Dr. C K Lok

 Dr. C K Lok
Context Diagram Example -
Uber
The context diagram shows Uber as the central system. External entities are
Uber customers and drivers

Customers provide account details, pickup location from GPS, destination, and
vehicle type preference. Drivers provide account and vehicle details, location
from GPS, and ability to accept/decline rides

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

The data flow diagram shows customers and drivers logging in and being
verified against separate databases. The customer's location and destination
are used to calculate fare and post the ride to available drivers

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Context Diagram Example -
Uber
A driver is selected, payment is made
from customer to driver, and the ride
occurs. The customer then rates the
driver, which is recorded in the driver
database
Dr. C K Lok
HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics
The rating system incentivizes good
service from drivers to receive more ride
requests. Both customers and drivers
benefit from and interact through the
Uber system
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 Dr. C K Lok
Developing DFDs (Cont.)

Level-0 diagram is a data flow diagram that represents a

system’s major processes, data flows, and data stores at a
high level of detail.

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

Processes are labeled 1.0, 2.0, etc. These will be
decomposed into more primitive (lower-level) DFDs.

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 Dr. C K Lok
Level-0 Diagram

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

Level-0 DFD of Hoosier Burger’s food-ordering
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 Dr. C K Lok
Data Flow Diagramming Rules

There are two DFD

guidelines that apply:

The inputs to a process

are different from the
• Processes purpose is to
outputs of that process. transform inputs into outputs.

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

Objects on a DFD have • Every process has a unique
unique names. name.

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 Dr. C K Lok
Data Flow Diagramming Rules
(Cont.)
Rules Governing Data Flow Diagramming

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

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 Dr. C K Lok
Data Flow Diagramming Rules
(Cont.)
Rules Governing Data Flow Diagramming

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

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 Dr. C K Lok
Data Flow Diagramming Rules
(Cont.)
Rules Governing Data Flow Diagramming (cont.)

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

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 Dr. C K Lok
Decomposition of DFDs

Functional decomposition is an iterative process of breaking

a system description down into finer and finer detail.

Creates a set of charts in which one process on a given chart

is explained in greater detail on another chart.

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

Continues until no subprocess can logically be broken down
any further.

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 Dr. C K Lok
Decomposition of DFDs (Cont.)

Level-1 diagram results from decomposition of

Level-0 diagram.

Level-n diagram is a DFD diagram that is the

result of n nested decompositions from a
process on a level-0 diagram.

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

Primitive DFD is the lowest level of a DFD.

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 Dr. C K Lok
Level-1 DFD
Level-1 diagram showing the Level-1 DFD shows
decomposition of Process 4.0 from the the sub-processes
level-0 diagram for Hoosier Burger’s of one of the
food-ordering system processes in the
Level-0 DFD.

This is a Level-1
DFD for Process
4.0.

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

Processes are labeled 4.1, 4.2, etc.
These can be further decomposed
in more primitive (lower-level)
DFDs if necessary.
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 Dr. C K Lok
Level-n DFD
Level-2 diagram showing the decomposition Level-n DFD shows
of Process 4.3 from the level-1 diagram for the sub-processes
Process 4.0 for Hoosier Burger’s food- of one of the
ordering system. processes in the
Level n-1 DFD.

This is a Level-2
DFD for Process

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

4.3.

Processes are labeled 4.3.1, 4.3.2, etc. If this is the

lowest level of the hierarchy, it is called a primitive DFD.

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 Dr. C K Lok
RMO Context
Diagram for
EXISTING
Customer
Support
System

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

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 Dr. C K Lok
RMO Subsystems and Use Cases for
EXISTING Customer Support System

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

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 Dr. C K Lok
Context Diagram for EXISTING
RMO Order Entry Subsystem

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

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 Dr. C K Lok
DFD Fragments for RMO Order Entry
Subsystem for Each Use Case

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

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 Dr. C K Lok
Diagram 0
for RMO
Order Entry
Subsystem
Combine DFD
fragments

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

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 Process 2
Create New Order
Decomposing

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HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics Dr. C K Lok

 Dr. C K Lok
Different Types of DFDs

Physical DFD

• One or more assumptions about implementation technology used to

process the data.
• Data flows and data stores identify actual name of the physical media.
o AWS, iMac, iPhone … etc.

Logical DFD

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

• Physical aspects of system are removed as much as possible.
• Assuming perfect internal implementation technology.
o Infinite storage, processes with capacity, zero lag time … etc.
• Reduced to data and processes that transform them.

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 Dr. C K Lok
Balancing DFDs

Balancing: conservation of inputs

Conservation Principle: conserve and outputs to a data flow diagram
inputs and outputs to a process at

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

process when that process is
the next level of decomposition
decomposed to a lower level

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 Dr. C K Lok
Balancing DFDs (Cont.)

Balanced means:

Number of inputs to lower level DFD equals number

of inputs to associated process of higher-level DFD

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

Number of outputs to lower level DFD equals number
of outputs to associated process of higher-level DFD

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 Dr. C K Lok
Balancing DFDs (Cont.)
An unbalanced set of data flow diagrams

(a) Context diagram

1 input
1 output
This is
(b) Level-0 diagram unbalanced
because the
process of the
context diagram

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

2 inputs has only one
input but the
1 output
Level-0 diagram
has two inputs.

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 Dr. C K Lok
Balancing DFDs (Cont.)

Data flow splitting is when a composite data flow at a

higher level is split and different parts go to different
processes in the lower level DFD.

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

The DFD remains balanced because the same data is
involved, but split into two parts.

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 Dr. C K Lok
Balancing DFDs (Cont.)

(a) Composite data flow

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

(b) Disaggregated data flows

Example of data flow splitting

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 Rules
Balancing DFDs: More DFD

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HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics Dr. C K Lok

 Dr. C K Lok
Guidelines for Drawing DFDs

• DFD must include all components

Completeness necessary for system.

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

• The extent to which information
contained on one level of a set of
Consistency nested DFDs is also included on other
levels

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 Dr. C K Lok
Guidelines for Drawing DFDs
(Cont.)
• Time is not represented well on DFDs.
Timing • Best to draw DFDs as if the system
has never started and will never stop.

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

• Analyst should expect to redraw
Iterative diagram several times before reaching
Development the closest approximation to the
system being modeled.

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 (Cont.)
Guidelines for Drawing DFDs

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HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics Dr. C K Lok

 Dr. C K Lok
Guidelines for Drawing DFDs
(Cont.)
Rules for stopping decomposition

When each process has been reduced to

a single decision, calculation or database
operation

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

When each data store represents data
about a single entity

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 Dr. C K Lok
Guidelines for Drawing DFDs
(Cont.)

Rules for stopping decomposition, cont.

When the system user does not care to see any more
detail

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

When every data flow does not need to be split further
to show that data are handled in various ways

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 Dr. C K Lok
Guidelines for Drawing DFDs
(Cont.)
Rules for stopping decomposition, cont.

When you believe that you have shown

each business form or transaction, online
display and report as a single data flow

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

When you believe that there is a
separate process for each choice on all
lowest-level menu options

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 Dr. C K Lok
Summary

Draw data Use data

flow Decompose Balance flow
Understand data flow high-level
logical diagrams of diagrams
diagrams and low-
process well- for
structured into lower- level data analyzing
modeling level flow

HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics

via DFDs. process information
diagrams. diagrams.
models. systems.

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 Q&A
Thanks!
Let’s explore IS Analysis (IV)

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HKU | Faculty of Business and Economics Dr. C K Lok