Active Database Rules with Transaction-Conscious Stable-Model Semantics

Semantics represents a major problem area for active databases in as much as (i) there is no formal framework for defining an implementation-independent semantics of active rules, and (ii) the various systems developed so far have ad-hoc operational semantics that are widely different from each other. This situation contributes to the difficulty of predicting the run-time behavior of sets of rules: thus, ensuring the termination of a given set of rules is currently viewed as a major research issue. In this paper, we introduce a durable change semantics for active database rules; this semantics improves Starburst's deferred activation notion with concepts taken from Postgres and Heraclitus and the semantic foundations of deductive databases. We provide a formal logic-based model for this transaction-oriented semantics, show that it is amenable to efficient implementation, and prove that it solves the non-termination problem.

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