Characterization of the effects of schema change

Schema evolution occurs frequently in practice. In this paper, we show that the entire schema does not need to be redesigned every time a change is made. We characterize the subschema affected by basic schema operations, which allows us to limit the scope of checking required and have a guarantee of...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Information sciences 1996-10, Vol.94 (1), p.23-39
Main Authors: Ewald, C.A., Orlowska, M.E.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Applied sciences
Computer science
control theory
systems
Exact sciences and technology
Information systems. Data bases
Memory organisation. Data processing
Software
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Summary:Schema evolution occurs frequently in practice. In this paper, we show that the entire schema does not need to be redesigned every time a change is made. We characterize the subschema affected by basic schema operations, which allows us to limit the scope of checking required and have a guarantee of the overall design being correct (safe changes). In addition, we characterize the effects on the actual relations of the addition and removal of constraints. In some cases, relations may have to be added to or removed from the database in order to preserve correctness.
ISSN:0020-0255
1872-6291
DOI:10.1016/0020-0255(96)00134-X