{"id":392,"date":"2025-03-10T13:39:12","date_gmt":"2025-03-10T17:39:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/businessanalysis\/?page_id=392"},"modified":"2025-03-10T17:05:28","modified_gmt":"2025-03-10T21:05:28","slug":"data-flow-diagram-dfd","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/businessanalysis\/?page_id=392","title":{"rendered":"Data Flow Diagram (DFD)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>1. What is a Data Flow Diagram<\/strong>?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>A Data Flow Diagram (DFD) is a visual representation of how data moves through a process or system. It depicts the flow of information between external entities, processes, and data stores.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>DFDs are widely used in system analysis and design to understand, refine, and document business processes.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>2. Common Diagramming Symbols<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>In Data Flow Diagrams (DFDs), the most common symbols are:<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<table id=\"tablepress-4\" class=\"tablepress tablepress-id-4\">\n<tbody class=\"row-hover\">\n<tr class=\"row-1\">\n\t<td class=\"column-1\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/businessanalysis\/files\/2025\/03\/DFD-Process.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"100\" height=\"46\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-402\" \/><\/td><td class=\"column-2\">Process: Circles or Rounded Rectangles indicate a function or activity that transforms inputs into outputs.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr class=\"row-2\">\n\t<td class=\"column-1\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/businessanalysis\/files\/2025\/02\/Arrow.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"65\" height=\"14\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-78\" \/><\/td><td class=\"column-2\">Data Flow: Arrows represent the movement of data between entities, processes, and data stores.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr class=\"row-3\">\n\t<td class=\"column-1\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/businessanalysis\/files\/2025\/02\/ProcessStep.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"85\" height=\"43\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-84\" \/><\/td><td class=\"column-2\">External Entity: Rectangles depict an external source or destination of data, such as a user, system, or organization outside the DFD scope.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr class=\"row-4\">\n\t<td class=\"column-1\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/businessanalysis\/files\/2025\/03\/DFD-Data-Store.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"141\" height=\"33\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-403\" \/><\/td><td class=\"column-2\">Data Store: Two Parallel Lines or Open-Ended Rectangles represent a repository where data is stored for later retrieval or processing.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<!-- #tablepress-4 from cache -->\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>These symbols follow the conventions of Gane &amp; Sarson or Yourdon &amp; DeMarco notation, which are the two most commonly used notations for DFDs.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>3. Example<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>The example below visually represents how data flows between customers, the staff, and the system processes for a restaurant service.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"883\" height=\"372\" src=\"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/businessanalysis\/files\/2025\/03\/DFD-Example.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-407\" srcset=\"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/businessanalysis\/files\/2025\/03\/DFD-Example.jpg 883w, https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/businessanalysis\/files\/2025\/03\/DFD-Example-300x126.jpg 300w, https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/businessanalysis\/files\/2025\/03\/DFD-Example-768x324.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 883px) 100vw, 883px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>1. What is a Data Flow Diagram? 2. Common Diagramming Symbols 3. Example<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4975,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-392","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/businessanalysis\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/392","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/businessanalysis\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/businessanalysis\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/businessanalysis\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4975"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/businessanalysis\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=392"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/businessanalysis\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/392\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":437,"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/businessanalysis\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/392\/revisions\/437"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/businessanalysis\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=392"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}