Publications Details

A comparison of IDEF1X and NIAM ISDM

Sharp, J.K.

This paper describes the major differences in the IDEFlX and NIAM ISDM information modeling methodologies and presents the different philosophies behind these methodologies. The IDEFlX methodology base document comes from the Integrated Information Support System (IISS) project sponsored by the US Air Force. The IISS project office was contacted and they supplied the referenced document as the best base description of this methodology. The NIAM ISDM methodology base documents present the general NIAM methodology. IDEFlX is a variant of the entity-attribute-relationship (E-A-R) approach to data modeling and although many other variants exist, the comparison presented here covers the common aspects of entity-relationship approaches. This comparison identifies and illustrates the differences in the two methodologies.