Declarative Specification and Evaluation of Database Updates

An update specifies not only assumptions that are required for the current database, but also assertions that will hold in a new database. Queries are special cases of updates that contain assertions about only the current database. Inspired by connectives and quantifiers in queries, we develop an update calculus that extends relational calculus with assertions about a new database and a new connective, namely sequential composition. An update algebra is also presented that associates with each tuple in an update relation a transaction — a canonical form of updates. We show that update calculus and algebra are equivalent, and both support expressive set-based and nondeterministic updates. Finally, we introduce a formal notion of answers of updates with respect to a database, and develop a sound and complete algorithm for update evaluation.

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