Project Information:
Project Title: "Collaborative
Research: Graceful Evolution and Historical Queries in Information Systems-- a
Unified Approach "
PI:
Vassilis J. Tsotras
Award Number: IIS-0705916
Duration: 09/01/2007 through
08/31/2010
This is a collaborative project with:
IIS-0705345
PI:
Carlo Zaniolo
University of California, Los Angeles
and
IIS-0705589
PI:
Victor Vianu, Co-PI: Alin B
Deutsch
University of California, San Diego
Web Page:
http://www.cs.ucr.edu/~tsotras/meta-manager
Project Summary:
Database schema evolution is a
constant in the life-cycle of Information Systems, and a source of major costs
for maintenance, upgrading, and service down time. The traditional process of
installing a new schema, converting the database, and rewriting applications is
slow and laborious. Instead, this project develops the novel technology whereby
the schema evolution problem is reduced to coordinating mappings between
multiple concurrent versions of schema, applications, and database. The
project's approach consists of developing: (i) XML-based architectures for
unifying the management of evolving data and metadata, (ii) methods for
capturing evolution via schema mappings, (iii) efficient mapping techniques for
queries and applications. These advances will enable the development of the
MetaManager, a system that supports: (a) preserving and querying database
histories, and (b) better planning on how-to evolve current schema versions,
via evaluation and testing of ``what-if'' scenarios. Its functionality and
performance will be validated using various testbeds, including the SDSC
Storage Request Broker, which hosts scientific data for research groups ranging
from astrophysicists to biologists. This novel and timely approach provides a
solution to both the evolution and preservation of information systems. Because
of the key role played by IS, a broad range of scientific, educational, and
economic activities will benefit. Project funds will support training of PhD
students while undergraduate research interns will train on schema-evolution
scenarios using the MetaManager. The technology will become part of DB-design
courses.