Affiliation:
1. DIMES, University of Calabria, Via Pietro Bucci, Cubo, Rende, CS, Italy
2. Department of Computer Science, University of Kentucky, Davis Marksbury Building, Rose Street, Lexington, KY, USA
Abstract
Abstract
This paper introduces and studies a declarative framework for updating views over indefinite databases. An indefinite database is a database with null values that are represented, following the standard database approach, by a single null constant. Typically a database is represented by a single set of facts $D$ that model what is known to be true. This paper proposes a model of an indefinite extensional database that is more expressive with respect to the closed-world assumption (CWA) adapted for the setting of indefinite databases (Libkin, 1995, A semantics-based approach to design of query languages for partial information. In Semantics in Databases, vol. 1358 of LNCS, pp. 170–208. Springer; der Meyden, 1998, Logical approaches to incomplete information: a survey. In Logics for Databases and Information Systems, pp. 307–356. Kluwer Academic Publishers, Norwell, MA, USA). More specifically, in our model, databases are determined by two sets of facts: $D$ representing, as usual, all facts that are true in the database, and $E$ that is meant to represent exceptions to the ‘unknown range’, i.e. facts that cannot be unknown. Intuitively, unless they are explicitly implied to be true by the first set, the facts specified as exceptions are assumed false. The semantics is given by means of a two-level CWA tailored to the case of indefinite information. The paper characterizes the semantics of indefinite databases in terms of their possible worlds that are obtained by instantiating occurrences of null values by concrete constants and defines several classes of database repairs that realize view-update requests. Most notable is the class of constrained repairs. Constrained repairs change the database ‘minimally’and avoid making arbitrary commitments. They narrow down the space of alternative ways to fulfill the view-update request to those that are grounded, in a certain strong sense, in the database, the view and the view-update request.
Publisher
Oxford University Press (OUP)
Reference56 articles.
1. Towards a theory of declarative knowledge;Apt,1988
2. Answer sets for consistent query answering in inconsistent databases;Arenas;TPLP,2003
3. Updating intensional predicates in datalog;Atzeni;Data & Knowledge Engineering,1992
4. Update semantics of relational views;Bancilhon;ACM Transactions on Database Systems,1981
Cited by
2 articles.
订阅此论文施引文献
订阅此论文施引文献,注册后可以免费订阅5篇论文的施引文献,订阅后可以查看论文全部施引文献
1. Poster SIMPATICO 3D;2022 IEEE Symposium on Computers and Communications (ISCC);2022-06-30
2. Existential active integrity constraints;Expert Systems with Applications;2021-04