Staircase Join: Teach a Relational DBMS to Watch its (Axis) Steps

Relational query processors derive much of their effectiveness from the awareness of specific table properties like sort order, size, or absence of duplicate tuples. This text applies (and adapts) this successful principle to database-supported XML and XPath processing: the relational system is made tree aware, i.e., tree properties like subtree size, intersection of paths, inclusion or disjointness of subtrees are made explicit. We propose a local change to the database kernel, the staircase join, which encapsulates the necessary tree knowledge needed to improve XPath performance. Staircase join operates on an XML encoding which makes this knowledge available at the cost of simple integer operations (e.g., +, <=). We finally report on quite promising experiments with a staircase join enhanced main-memory database kernel

Reasoning & Querying – State of the Art

Various query languages for Web and Semantic Web data, both for practical use and as an area of research in the scientific community, have emerged in recent years. At the same time, the broad adoption of the internet where keyword search is used in many applications, e.g. search engines, has familiarized casual users with using keyword queries to retrieve information on the internet. Unlike this easy-to-use querying, traditional query languages require knowledge of the language itself as well as of the data to be queried. Keyword-based query languages for XML and RDF bridge the gap between the two, aiming at enabling simple querying of semi-structured data, which is relevant e.g. in the context of the emerging Semantic Web. This article presents an overview of the field of keyword querying for XML and RDF

The relational XQuery puzzle: a look-back on the pieces found so far

Given the tremendous versatility of relational database implementations toward awide range of database problems, it seems only natural to consider them as back-ends for XML data processing. Yet, the assumptions behind the language XQuery are considerably different to those in traditional RDBMSs. The underlying data model is a tree, data and results carry an intrinsic order, queries are described using explicit iteration and, after all, problems are everything else but regular. Solving the relational XQuery puzzle, therefore, has challenged anumber of research groups over the past years. The purpose of this article is to summarize and assess some of the results that have been obtained during this period to solve the puzzle. Our main focus is on the Pathfinder XQuery compiler, afull reference implementation of apurely relational XQuery processor. As we dissect its components, we relate them to other work in the field and also point to open problems and limitations in the context of relational XQuery processin

Four Lessons in Versatility or How Query Languages Adapt to the Web

Exposing not only human-centered information, but machine-processable data on the Web is one of the commonalities of recent Web trends. It has enabled a new kind of applications and businesses where the data is used in ways not foreseen by the data providers. Yet this exposition has fractured the Web into islands of data, each in different Web formats: Some providers choose XML, others RDF, again others JSON or OWL, for their data, even in similar domains. This fracturing stifles innovation as application builders have to cope not only with one Web stack (e.g., XML technology) but with several ones, each of considerable complexity. With Xcerpt we have developed a rule- and pattern based query language that aims to give shield application builders from much of this complexity: In a single query language XML and RDF data can be accessed, processed, combined, and re-published. Though the need for combined access to XML and RDF data has been recognized in previous work (including the W3C’s GRDDL), our approach differs in four main aspects: (1) We provide a single language (rather than two separate or embedded languages), thus minimizing the conceptual overhead of dealing with disparate data formats. (2) Both the declarative (logic-based) and the operational semantics are unified in that they apply for querying XML and RDF in the same way. (3) We show that the resulting query language can be implemented reusing traditional database technology, if desirable. Nevertheless, we also give a unified evaluation approach based on interval labelings of graphs that is at least as fast as existing approaches for tree-shaped XML data, yet provides linear time and space querying also for many RDF graphs. We believe that Web query languages are the right tool for declarative data access in Web applications and that Xcerpt is a significant step towards a more convenient, yet highly efficient data access in a “Web of Data”

Web and Semantic Web Query Languages

A number of techniques have been developed to facilitate powerful data retrieval on the Web and Semantic Web. Three categories of Web query languages can be distinguished, according to the format of the data they can retrieve: XML, RDF and Topic Maps. This article introduces the spectrum of languages falling into these categories and summarises their salient aspects. The languages are introduced using common sample data and query types. Key aspects of the query languages considered are stressed in a conclusion