Supporting quantified queries in distributed databases

We show that some relational queries, which we call quantified queries are not well supported in distributed environments. We give a formal definition of quantified queries, propose a language in which to express said queries and provide a procedure to compute answers in this new language in the context of distributed databases. The proposed language is made up of high-level, declarative operators (called generalised quantifiers), and therefore it can be used in combination with several distributed frameworks. Our approach is designed to be as general as possible; it assumes horizontally partitioned relations, but nothing else, so no data placement or replication is used. We present an implementation and algorithms for the new language, propose some basic optimisations and give experimental results which show that the new approach is indeed quite efficient and scales well.     

Supporting ranked Boolean similarity queries in MARS

To address the emerging needs of applications that require access to and retrieval of multimedia objects, we are developing the Multimedia Analysis and Retrieval System (MARS). In this paper, we concentrate on the retrieval subsystem of MARS and its support for content-based queries over image databases. Content-based retrieval techniques have been extensively studied for textual documents in the area of automatic information retrieval. This paper describes how these techniques can be adapted for ranked retrieval over image databases. Specifically, we discuss the ranking and retrieval algorithms developed in MARS based on the Boolean retrieval model and describe the results of our experiments that demonstrate the effectiveness of the developed model for image retrieval     

Supporting multi-dimensional queries in mobile P2P network

Nowadays, as the mobile services become widely used, there is a strong demand for mobile support in P2P search techniques. In this paper, we introduce a new cost model for searching multi-dimensional data in mobile P2P environment and propose a novel multi-dimensional mobile P2P search framework called MIME. MIME models the physical node layout in a two-dimensional plane and keeps records of the locations of the nodes to construct a proximity-aware P2P overlay. MIME is able to employ two different split schemes for the construction of the overlay. We propose query processing techniques for such P2P overlay. In addition, we employ a novel expanding method for tuning the performance of KNN queries in MIME. We also discuss two adaptive features incorporated into MIME to support mobility: an update algorithm that makes dynamic updates to the overlay, and a cache mechanism that reduces the load of data migration during the updates. The experimental results show that the proposed techniques are effective, and that MIME achieves significant performance improvements in Point, Range, and KNN queries compared to the conventional system.     

Supporting historic queries in sensor networks with flash storage

Many recent sensor devices are being equipped with flash memories due to their unique advantages: non-volatile storage, small size, shock-resistance, fast read access and power efficiency. The ability of storing large amounts of data in sensor devices necessitates the need for efficient indexing structures to locate required information.The challenge with flash memories is that they are unsuitable for maintaining dynamic data structures because of their specific read, write and wear constraints; this combined with very limited data memory on sensor devices prohibits the direct application of most existing indexing methods.In this paper we propose a suite of index structures and algorithms which permit us to efficiently support several types of historical online queries on flash-equipped sensor devices: temporally constrained aggregate queries, historical online sampling queries and pattern matching queries. We have implemented our methods using nesC and have run extensive experiments in TOSSIM, the simulation environment of TinyOS. Our experimental evaluation using trace-driven real world data sets demonstrates the efficiency of our indexing algorithms.     

Learning erasing pattern languages with queries

A pattern is a finite string of constant and variable symbols. The non-erasing language generated by a pattern is the set of all strings of constant symbols that can be obtained by substituting non-empty strings for variables. In order to build the erasing language generated by a pattern, it is also admissible to substitute the empty string.The present paper deals with the problem of learning erasing pattern languages within Angluin's model of learning with queries. Moreover, the learnability of erasing pattern languages with queries is studied when additional information is available. The results obtained are compared with previously known results in case non-erasing pattern languages have to be learned.First, when regular pattern languages have to be learned, it is shown that the learnability results for the non-erasing case remain valid, if the proper superclass of all erasing regular pattern languages is the object of learning. Second, in the general case, serious differences have been observed. For instance, it turns out that arbitrary erasing pattern languages cannot be learned in settings in which, in the non-erasing case, even polynomially many queries will suffice.     

Supporting ranking queries on uncertain and incomplete data

Large databases with uncertain information are becoming more common in many applications including data integration, location tracking, and Web search. In these applications, ranking records with uncertain attributes introduces new problems that are fundamentally different from conventional ranking. Specifically, uncertainty in records’ scores induces a partial order over records, as opposed to the total order that is assumed in the conventional ranking settings. In this paper, we present a new probabilistic model, based on partial orders, to encapsulate the space of possible rankings originating from score uncertainty. Under this model, we formulate several ranking query types with different semantics. We describe and analyze a set of efficient query evaluation algorithms. We show that our techniques can be used to solve the problem of rank aggregation in partial orders under two widely adopted distance metrics. In addition, we design sampling techniques based on Markov chains to compute approximate query answers. Our experimental evaluation uses both real and synthetic data. The experimental study demonstrates the efficiency and effectiveness of our techniques under various configurations.     

Efficient algorithms for descendant-only tree pattern queries

Tree pattern matching is a fundamental problem that has a wide range of applications in Web data management, XML processing, and selective data dissemination. In this paper we develop efficient algorithms for the tree homeomorphism problem, i.e., the problem of matching a tree pattern with exclusively transitive (descendant) edges. We first prove that deciding whether there is a tree homeomorphism is LOGSPACE-complete, improving on the current LOGCFL upper bound. Furthermore, we develop a practical algorithm for the tree homeomorphism decision problem that is both space- and time-efficient. The algorithm is in LOGDCFL and space consumption is strongly bounded, while the running time is linear in the size of the data tree. This algorithm immediately generalizes to the problem of matching the tree pattern against all subtrees of the data tree, preserving the mentioned efficiency properties.     

Efficient processing of partially specified twig pattern queries

As huge volumes of data are organized or exported in tree-structured form, it is quite necessary to extract useful information from these data collections using effective and efficient query processing methods. A natural way of retrieving desired information from XML documents is using twig pattern (TP), which is, actually, the core component of existing XML query languages. Twig pattern possesses the inherent feature that query nodes on the same path have concrete precedence relationships. It is this featu...     

SPARQL graph pattern rewriting for OWL-DL inference queries

This paper focuses on the issue of OWL-DL ontology queries implemented in SPARQL. Currently, ontology repositories construct inference ontology models, and match SPARQL queries to the models, to derive inference results. Because an inference model uses much more storage space than the original model, and cannot be reused as inference requirements vary, this method is not suitable for large-scale deployment. To solve this problem, this paper proposes a novel method that passes rewritten SPARQL queries to the original ontology model, to retrieve inference results. We define OWL-DL inference rules and apply them to rewriting Graph Patterns in queries. The paper classifies the inference rules and discusses how these rules affect query rewriting. To illustrate the advantages of our proposal, we present a prototype system based on Jena, and address query optimization, to eliminate the disadvantages of augmented query sentences. We perform a set of query tests and compare the results with related works. The results show that the proposed method results in significantly improved query efficiency, without compromising completeness or soundness.

DTD约束下的XML树模式查询最小化

目前大部分XML查询语言都使用树模式来匹配待查询的XML文档树以得到所需要的、与模式树相吻合的查询结果,此效率在很大程度上取决于XML模式树的大小,那么尽可能快速地查找并删除查询模式树中的冗余节点就变得十分重要。重点讨论DTD约束下树模式的最小化问题,将DTD兄弟约束SC拓展成扩展兄弟约束ESC,使其能够表达DTD约束中的祖先-后代关系;并指出只包含{ESC,/,//,[],*}的查询树模式的最小化问题的复杂度是指数级的,且当模式树是分支受限的时候,其最小化问题的复杂度是多项式时间的;最后给出了一个多项式时间的受限分支的模式树最小化算法。     

Incremental sequence-based frequent query pattern mining from XML queries

Existing algorithms of mining frequent XML query patterns (XQPs) employ a candidate generate-and-test strategy. They involve expensive candidate enumeration and costly tree-containment checking. Further, most of existing methods compute the frequencies of candidate query patterns from scratch periodically by checking the entire transaction database, which consists of XQPs transferred from user query logs. However, it is not straightforward to maintain such discovered frequent patterns in real XML databases as there may be frequent updates that may not only invalidate some existing frequent query patterns but also generate some new frequent query patterns. Therefore, a drawback of existing methods is that they are rather inefficient for the evolution of transaction databases. To address above-mentioned problems, this paper proposes an efficient algorithm ESPRIT to mine frequent XQPs without costly tree-containment checking. ESPRIT transforms XML queries into sequences using a one-to-one mapping technique and mines the frequent sequences to generate frequent XQPs. We propose two efficient incremental algorithms, ESPRIT-i and ESPRIT-i ⁺, to incrementally mine frequent XQPs. We devise several novel optimization techniques of query rewriting, cache lookup, and cache replacement to improve the answerability and the hit rate of caching. We have implemented our algorithms and conducted a set of experimental studies on various datasets. The experimental results demonstrate that our algorithms achieve high efficiency and scalability and outperform state-of-the-art methods significantly.     

Adding regular expressions to graph reachability and pattern queries

It is increasingly common to find graphs in which edges are of different types, indicating a variety of relationships. For such graphs we propose a class of reachability queries and a class of graph patterns, in which an edge is specified with a regular expression of a certain form, expressing the connectivity of a data graph via edges of various types. In addition, we define graph pattern matching based on a revised notion of graph simulation. On graphs in emerging applications such as social networks, we show that these queries are capable of finding more sensible information than their traditional counterparts. Better still, their increased expressive power does not come with extra complexity. Indeed, (1) we investigate their containment and minimization problems, and show that these fundamental problems are in quadratic time for reachability queries and are in cubic time for pattern queries. (2) We develop an algorithm for answering reachability queries, in quadratic time as for their traditional counterpart. (3) We provide two cubic-time algorithms for evaluating graph pattern queries, as opposed to the NP-completeness of graph pattern matching via subgraph isomorphism. (4) The effectiveness and efficiency of these algorithms are experimentally verified using real-life data and synthetic data.     

Answering pattern match queries in large graph databases via graph embedding

The growing popularity of graph databases has generated interesting data management problems, such as subgraph search, shortest path query, reachability verification, and pattern matching. Among these, a pattern match query is more flexible compared with a subgraph search and more informative compared with a shortest path or a reachability query. In this paper, we address distance-based pattern match queries over a large data graph G. Due to the huge search space, we adopt a filter-and-refine framework to answer a pattern match query over a large graph. We first find a set of candidate matches by a graph embedding technique and then evaluate these to find the exact matches. Extensive experiments confirm the superiority of our method.     

Least common container of tree pattern queries and its applications

Tree patterns represent important fragments of XPath. In this paper, we show that some classes \({\mathcal{C}}\) of tree patterns exhibit such a property that, given a finite number of compatible tree patterns \({P_1, \ldots, P_n\in \mathcal{C}}\), there exists another pattern P such that P ₁, . . . , P _n are all contained in P, and for any tree pattern \({Q\in \mathcal{C}}\), P ₁, . . . , P _n are all contained in Q if and only if P is contained in Q. We experimentally demonstrate that the pattern P is usually much smaller than P ₁, . . . , P _n combined together. Using the existence of P above, we show that testing whether a tree pattern, P, is contained in another, \({Q\in \mathcal{C}}\), under an acyclic schema graph G, can be reduced to testing whether P _G , a transformed version of P, is contained in Q without any schema graph, provided that the distinguished node of P is not labeled *. We then show that, under G, the maximal contained rewriting (MCR) of a tree pattern Q using a view V can be found by finding the MCR of Q using V _G without G, when there are no *-nodes on the distinguished path of V and no *-nodes in Q.     

DTD约束下的树模式查询的一致性判断

树模式查询被广泛地应用XML数据查询中。树模式查询的一致性判断可以避免不必要的计算,节省查询时间,从而提高查询效率。给出了查询一致性的定义,基于子路径的概念,提出文档类型定义(DTD)约束下的树模式查询的一致性判断算法,并对算法的时间复杂度进行了分析。通过分析比较,该算法是有效的。     

Knowledge building in mathematics: Supporting collaborative learning in pattern problems

While it has been suggested that patterning activities support early algebra learning, it is widely acknowledged that the shift from perceiving patterns to understanding algebraic functions—and correspondingly, from reporting empirical patterns to providing explanations—is difficult. This paper reports on the collaborations of grade 4 students (n = 68) from three classrooms in diverse urban settings, connected through a knowledge-building environment (Knowledge Forum), when solving mathematical generalizing problems as part of an early algebra research project. The purpose of this study was to investigate the underlying principles of idea improvement and epistemic agency and the potential of knowledge building—as supported by Knowledge Forum—to support student work. Our analyses of student-generated collaborative workspaces revealed that students were able to find multiple rules for challenging problems and revise their own conjectures regarding those rules. Furthermore, the discourse was sustained over 8 weeks and students were able to find similarities across problem types without the support of teachers or researchers, suggesting that these grade-4 students had developed a disposition for evidence use and justification that eludes much older students.