A Semantic Framework for Designing Temporal SQL Databases
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Abstract
Many real world applications need to capture a mix of temporal and non-temporal entities, relationships and attributes. These concepts add complexity when designing database schemas and existing works are unable to capture the temporal semantics precisely. We propose a new framework for designing SQL databases that distinguishes
between temporal and non-temporal concepts while also distinguishing between entities, relationships and attributes at every step. The framework rst utilizes an Entity-Relationship (ER) diagram to capture the real world semantics. Temporal constructs in the ER diagram are then annotated. Finally we map the temporal ER diagram to a normal form database schema that reduces redundant data by separating current data from historical data.We also describe how data consistency is maintained during updates. Experiment results show that we can generate database schemas that support efficientt access to both current and historical information, and enable better management of temporal data.