10,875 research outputs found
Object-oriented querying of existing relational databases
In this paper, we present algorithms which allow an object-oriented
querying of existing relational databases. Our goal is to provide an improved query
interface for relational systems with better query facilities than SQL. This
seems to be very important since, in real world applications, relational systems
are most commonly used and their dominance will remain in the near future. To
overcome the drawbacks of relational systems, especially the poor query facilities
of SQL, we propose a schema transformation and a query translation algorithm.
The schema transformation algorithm uses additional semantic information to enhance
the relational schema and transform it into a corresponding object-oriented
schema. If the additional semantic information can be deducted from an underlying
entity-relationship design schema, the schema transformation may be done
fully automatically. To query the created object-oriented schema, we use the
Structured Object Query Language (SOQL) which provides declarative query facilities
on objects. SOQL queries using the created object-oriented schema are
much shorter, easier to write and understand and more intuitive than corresponding
S Q L queries leading to an enhanced usability and an improved querying of
the database. The query translation algorithm automatically translates SOQL queries
into equivalent SQL queries for the original relational schema
The StarView intelligent query mechanism
The StarView interface is being developed to facilitate the retrieval of scientific and engineering data produced by the Hubble Space Telescope. While predefined screens in the interface can be used to specify many common requests, ad hoc requests require a dynamic query formulation capability. Unfortunately, logical level knowledge is too sparse to support this capability. In particular, essential formulation knowledge is lost when the domain of interest is mapped to a set of database relation schemas. Thus, a system known as QUICK has been developed that uses conceptual design knowledge to facilitate query formulation. By heuristically determining strongly associated objects at the conceptual level, QUICK is able to formulate semantically reasonable queries in response to high-level requests that specify only attributes of interest. Moreover, by exploiting constraint knowledge in the conceptual design, QUICK assures that queries are formulated quickly and will execute efficiently
The ERA of FOLE: Foundation
This paper discusses the representation of ontologies in the first-order
logical environment FOLE (Kent 2013). An ontology defines the primitives with
which to model the knowledge resources for a community of discourse (Gruber
2009). These primitives, consisting of classes, relationships and properties,
are represented by the entity-relationship-attribute ERA data model (Chen
1976). An ontology uses formal axioms to constrain the interpretation of these
primitives. In short, an ontology specifies a logical theory. This paper is the
first in a series of three papers that provide a rigorous mathematical
representation for the ERA data model in particular, and ontologies in general,
within the first-order logical environment FOLE. The first two papers show how
FOLE represents the formalism and semantics of (many-sorted) first-order logic
in a classification form corresponding to ideas discussed in the Information
Flow Framework (IFF). In particular, this first paper provides a foundation
that connects elements of the ERA data model with components of the first-order
logical environment FOLE, and the second paper provides a superstructure that
extends FOLE to the formalisms of first-order logic. The third paper defines an
interpretation of FOLE in terms of the transformational passage, first
described in (Kent 2013), from the classification form of first-order logic to
an equivalent interpretation form, thereby defining the formalism and semantics
of first-order logical/relational database systems (Kent 2011). The FOLE
representation follows a conceptual structures approach, that is completely
compatible with formal concept analysis (Ganter and Wille 1999) and information
flow (Barwise and Seligman 1997)
Potentially Polluting Marine Sites GeoDB: An S-100 Geospatial Database as an Effective Contribution to the Protection of the Marine Environment
Potentially Polluting Marine Sites (PPMS) are objects on, or areas of, the seabed that may release pollution in the future. A rationale for, and design of, a geospatial database to inventory and manipu-late PPMS is presented. Built as an S-100 Product Specification, it is specified through human-readable UML diagrams and implemented through machine-readable GML files, and includes auxiliary information such as pollution-control resources and potentially vulnerable sites in order to support analyses of the core data. The design and some aspects of implementation are presented, along with metadata requirements and structure, and a perspective on potential uses of the database
XML content warehousing: Improving sociological studies of mailing lists and web data
In this paper, we present the guidelines for an XML-based approach for the
sociological study of Web data such as the analysis of mailing lists or
databases available online. The use of an XML warehouse is a flexible solution
for storing and processing this kind of data. We propose an implemented
solution and show possible applications with our case study of profiles of
experts involved in W3C standard-setting activity. We illustrate the
sociological use of semi-structured databases by presenting our XML Schema for
mailing-list warehousing. An XML Schema allows many adjunctions or crossings of
data sources, without modifying existing data sets, while allowing possible
structural evolution. We also show that the existence of hidden data implies
increased complexity for traditional SQL users. XML content warehousing allows
altogether exhaustive warehousing and recursive queries through contents, with
far less dependence on the initial storage. We finally present the possibility
of exporting the data stored in the warehouse to commonly-used advanced
software devoted to sociological analysis
Reasoning about Independence in Probabilistic Models of Relational Data
We extend the theory of d-separation to cases in which data instances are not
independent and identically distributed. We show that applying the rules of
d-separation directly to the structure of probabilistic models of relational
data inaccurately infers conditional independence. We introduce relational
d-separation, a theory for deriving conditional independence facts from
relational models. We provide a new representation, the abstract ground graph,
that enables a sound, complete, and computationally efficient method for
answering d-separation queries about relational models, and we present
empirical results that demonstrate effectiveness.Comment: 61 pages, substantial revisions to formalisms, theory, and related
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