The present invention relates to the mapping of source documents to target documents and, more particularly, to methods and apparatus for mapping XML source documents to target documents.
In order to exchange, migrate and integrate XML data, documents of a source XML (DTD) schema must be mapped to documents of a target schema. XML mappings can be defined, for example, in a query language, such as XQuery or XSLT, but such queries may be large and complex, and in practice it is desirable that XML mappings (1) guarantee type-safety and (2) preserve information.
The document produced by an XML mapping should conform to a target schema, guaranteeing type safety. This may be difficult to verify, however, for mappings defined in XQuery or XSLT. See, e.g., N. Alone et al., “XML with Data Values: Typechecking Revisited,” Principles of Database Systems (PODS) (2001). Further, since in many applications one does not want to lose the original information of the source data, a mapping should also preserve information. Criteria for information preservation include: (1) invertibility (i.e., whether the source document can be recovered from the target document); and (2) query preservation (i.e., for a particular XML query language, whether all queries on source documents in that language be answered on target documents).
While a number of techniques have been proposed for information preservation for traditional database transformations, a need still exists for methods and apparatus for mapping XML documents. A number of tools and models have been proposed for finding XML mappings at the schema or instance-level, but such tools and models have not addressed invertibility and query preservation for XML. A need therefore exists for methods and apparatus for mapping source documents to target documents that ensure type-safety or preservation of information (or both). A further need exists for efficient methods and apparatus for finding information-preserving XML mappings.
Generally, methods and apparatus are provided for mapping XML source schemas to a target schema using schema embeddings. According to one aspect of the invention, one or more edges in the one or more source schemas are mapped to one or more paths in at least one target schema. The disclosed mapping techniques ensure that (i) one or more source documents that conform to one or more of the source schemas can be recovered from one or more target documents that conform to the at least one target schema, if a mapping exists between the one or more of the source schemas and the at least one target schema; (ii) queries on one or more source documents that conform to one or more of the source schemas in a given query language can be answered on one or more target documents that conform to the at least one target schema; and (iii) the one or more target documents conform to a target schema.
Initially, one or more local embeddings are identified for individual productions in the one or more source schemas. The local embeddings can then be assembled into a schema embedding using a random order or a quality-specific order of the local embeddings. In a further variation, a candidate pool of local embeddings is generated and a heuristic solution to Maximum-Independent-Set is employed to assemble a valid schema embedding. When a conflict is detected during the assembly of the schema embedding, one or more non-conflicting local embeddings are generated.
A more complete understanding of the present invention, as well as further features and advantages of the present invention, will be obtained by reference to the following detailed description and drawings.
The present invention provides methods and apparatus for mapping source documents to target documents using schema embedding. Generally, schema embedding is a natural extension of graph similarity in which an edge in a source DTD schema may be mapped to a path, rather than a single edge, in a target DTD.
In the example shown in
The present invention provides methods and apparatus for information preserving XML mapping using schema embedding. Information preservation for XML mappings involves the notions of invertibility and query preservation. While the two notions coincide for relational mappings with respect to relational calculus, the present invention recognizes that they are in general different for XML mappings with respect to XML query languages. Furthermore, it is undecidable to determine whether or not an XML mapping defined in a simple fragment of XQuery (or XSLT) is information preserving.
To cope with the undecidability result, the present invention provides an XML mapping framework based on a novel notion of schema embeddings. A schema embedding is a natural extension of graph similarity in which an edge in a source DTD schema may be mapped to a path, rather than a single edge, in a target DTD. For example, the source DTDs and So and S1 of
In addition, the present invention provides algorithms to compute schema embeddings. The disclosed schema embedding generation algorithms are NP-complete to find an embedding between two DTDs, even when the DTDs are nonrecursive. Thus, algorithms for finding embeddings are necessarily heuristic. A building block of the disclosed algorithms is an efficient algorithm to find a local embedding for individual productions in the source schema. Based on this, three heuristic algorithms are developed to compute embeddings.
As discussed further below in conjunction with
DTDs, XPath Information Preservation
Consider a class of regular XPath queries, denoted by XR and defined as follows:
p=∈|A|p/text( )|p/p||p∪p|p*|p[q],
q=p|p/text( )=‘c’|position( )=k|q|qq|qq
where ∈ is the empty path (self), A is a label (element type), ‘∪’ is the union operator, ‘/’ is the child-axis, and * is the Kleene star; p is an XR expression, k is a natural number, c is a string constant, and ,
,
are the Boolean negation, conjunction and disjunction operators, respectively.
An XPath fragment of XR, denoted by , is defined by replacing p* with p//p in the definition above, where // is the descendant-or-self axis.
A (regular) XPath query p is evaluated at a context node v in an XML tree T, and its result is the set of nodes (ids) of T reachable viap from v, denoted by v[p].
B. DTDs
Consider DTDs of the form (Ele, P, r), where Ele is a finite set of element types; r is a distinguished type in Ele, called the root type; and P defines the element types. For each A in Ele, P(A) is a regular expression of the form:
a=str|∈|B1, . . . , Bn|B1+. . . +Bn|B*
where str denotes PCDATA, ∈ is the empty word, B is a type in Ele (referred to as a child of A), and ‘+’, ‘,’ and ‘*’ denote disjunction (with n>1), concatenation and the Kleene star, respectively. A→P(A) is referred to as the production of A. It is noted that this form of DTDs does not lose generality since any DTDs can be converted to this form (in linear time) by introducing new element types, and (regular) XPath queries on S can be rewritten into equivalent (regular) XPath queries on S′ in PTIME. See, M. Benedikt et al., “Xpath Satisfiability in the Presence of DTDs, PODS (2005).
A DTD S can be represented as a labeled graph GS, referred to as the graph of S. For each element type A in S, there is a unique node labeled A in GS, referred to as the A node. From the A-node there are edges to nodes representing child types in P(A), determined by the production A→P(A) of A. There are three different types of edges indicating different constructs. Specifically, if P(A) is B1, . . . , Bn then there is a solid edge from the A node to each Bi node; it is labeled with a position k if Bi is the k-th occurrence of a type B in P(A) (the label can be omitted if Bi's are distinct). If P(A) is B1+. . . +Bn then there is a dashed edge from the A node to each Bi node (without loss of generality it is assumed that Bi's are distinct in disjunction). If P(A) is B*, then there is a solid edge with a ‘*’ label from the A node to the B node. Note that a DTD is recursive if its graph is cyclic. When it is clear from the context, the DTD and its graph are used interchangeably, both referred to as S; similarly for A element type and A node.
For example,
An XML instance of a DTD S is a node-labeled tree that conforms to S. I(s) is used to denote the set of all instances of S. A DTD S is consistent if it has no useless element types, i.e., each type of S has an instance.
C. Invertibility and Query Preservation
For XML DTDs S1, S2, a mapping σd:I(S1)→I(S2) is invertible if there exists an inverse σd−1 of σd such that for any XML instance T∈I(S1),σd−1(σd(T))=T, where the notation ƒ(T) denotes the result of applying a function (or mapping, query) ƒ to T. In other words, the composition σd−1
For an XML query language L, a mapping σd is query preserving with respect to L if there exists a computable function F:L→L such that for any XML query Q∈L and any T∈I(S1), Q(T)=F(Q)(σd(T)), i.e., Q=F(Q)oσd.
Generally, invertibility is the ability that the original source XML document can be recovered from the target document; query preservation with respect to L indicates whether or not all queries of L on any source T of S1 can be effectively answered over σd(T), i.e., the mapping σd does not lose information of T when L queries are concerned.
The notions of invertibility and query preservation are inspired by (calculus) dominance and query dominance that were proposed for relational mappings. In contrast to query dominance, query preservation is defined with respect to a given XML query language that does not necessarily support query composition. Invertibility is defined for XML mappings and it only requires d−1 to be a partial function defined on σd(I(S1)).
A mapping σd:I(S1)→I(S2) is said to be information preserving with respect to L if it is both invertible and query preserving with respect to L.
Information Preservation
A. Invertibility and Query Preservation
Calculus dominance and query dominance have been shown to be equivalent for relational mappings. In contrast, invertibility and query preservation do not necessarily coincide for XML mappings and query languages. Recall the class X of XPath queries defined in the previous section.
There exists an invertible XML mapping that is not query preserving with respect to X; and there exists an XML mapping that is not invertible but is query-preserving with respect to the class of queries without positions qualifier.
Sufficient conditions are identified for the two to coincide:
Let L be any XML query language and νd be a mapping from I(S1)→I(S2)
Recall the class XR of regular XPath queries defined above. Although the identity mapping id is not definable in XR, query preservation with respect to XR is a stronger property than invertibility.
If an XML mapping σd is query preserving with respect to XR, then σd is invertible. Conversely, there exists a mapping σd that is invertible but is not query preserving with respect to XR.
B. Complexity
XML mappings are commonly defined in XQuery or XSLT. A natural yet important question is to decide whether or not an XML mapping is invertible or query preserving with respect to a query language L. Unfortunately, this is impossible for XML mappings defined in any language that subsumes first-order logic (FO, or relational algebra), e.g., XQuery, XSLT, even when L consists of projection queries only. Thus, it is beyond reach to answer these questions for XQuery or XSLT mappings.
It is undecidable to determine, given an XML mapping ad defined in any language subsuming FO,
1. whether or not σd is invertible; and
2. whether or not σd is query preserving with respect to projection queries.
Schema Embeddings for XML
The present invention provides a class of XML mappings that are information preserving.
XML mappings are specified at the schema level embeddings, and an automated derivation of instance-level mappings are provided from these embeddings. Schema embeddings, as used herein, extend the conventional notion of graph similarity by allowing edges in a source DTD schema to be mapped to a path in a target DTD with a “larger information capacity”. For example, a STAR edge can only be mapped to a path with at least one STAR edge.
A. Schema Level Embeddings
Consider a source XML DTD schema S1=(E1, P1, r1) and a target DTD S2=(E2,P2,r2). Generally, a schema embedding σ is a pair of functions (λ, path) that maps each A type in E1 to a λ(A) type in E2, and each edge (A, B) in S1 to a unique path (A,B) from λ(A) to λ(B) in S2, such that the S2 paths mapped from sibling edges in S1 are sufficiently distinct to allow information to be preserved.
(1) XR Paths
An XR over a DTD S=(E,P,r) is an XR query of the form p=η1/ . . . /ηk where k≧1, ηi is of the form A[q], and q is either true or a position( ) qualifier, such that ρ is a path in S and it carries all the position labels on the path. An XR path is called an AND path (respectively, OR path, and STAR path) if it is nonempty and consists of only solid or star edges (respectively, of solid edges and at least one dashed edge, and of solid edges and at least one edge labeled * ). Referring to
(2) Name Similarity
A similarity matrix for S1 and S2 is an |E1|×|E2| matrix, att, of numbers in the range [0,1]. For any A∈E1 and B∈E2 att (A,B) indicates the suitability of mapping A to B ,as determined by human domain experts or computed by an existing algorithm, such as the algorithm described in A. Doan et al., “Reconciling Schemas of Disparate Data Sources: A Machine-Learning Approach,” SIGMOD (2001).
(3) Type Mapping
A type mapping λ from S1 to S2 is a (total) function from E1 to E2; in particular, it maps the root of S1 to the root of S2, i.e., λ(r1)=r2. A type mapping λ is valid with respect to a similarity matrix att if for any A∈E1, att (A,λ(A))>0.
(4) Path Mapping
A path mapping from S1 to S2, denoted by σ:S1→S2 is a pair (λ, path), where λ is a type mapping and path is a function that maps each edge (A,B) in S1 to an XR path, path (A,B), that is from λ(A) to λ(B) in S2.
For particular element type A in E1, σ is valid for A if the following conditions hold, based on the production A→P1 (A) in S1:
The validity requires a path type condition and a prefix-free condition, which, as will be seen shortly, are important for deriving the instance-level mapping from σ.
For
(5) Schema Embedding
A schema embedding from S1 to S2 valid with respect to a similarity matrix att, is a path mapping σ=(λ, path) from S1 to S2 such that λ is valid with respect to att, and σ is valid for every element A in E1.
Assume a similarity matrix att such that att (A,A′)=1 for all A in the DTD So of
λ1 (db)=school, λ1(class)=course, λ1 (type)=category,
λ1 (A)=A/* A: cno, title, regular, project, prereq, str */
path1 (db, class)=courses/current/course
path1 (class, cno)=basic/cno
path1 (class, title)=basic/class/semester/title
path1 (class, type)=category
path1 (type, regular)=mandatory/regular
path1 (type, project)=advanced/project
path1 (regular, prereq)=required/prereq
path1 (prereq, class)=course
path1 (A, str)=text( ) /* A for cno, title */
Note that path1 (A,B) is a path in S denoting how to reach λ1 (B) from λ1 (A), i.e., the path is relative to λ1(A). For example, path1 (type, project) indicates how to reach project from a category context node in S, where category is mapped from type in S0 by λ1. Also observe that the similarity matrix att imposes no restrictions: any name in the source can be mapped to any name in the target; thus the embedding here is decided solely on the DTD structures.
In contrast, S0 cannot be mapped to S by graph similarity, which requires that node A in the source is mapped (similar) to B in the target only if all children of A are mapped (similar) to children of B. In other words, graph similarity maps an edge in the source to an edge in the target.
(6) Embedding Quality
There are many possible metrics. The quality of a schema embedding σ=(λ, path) with respect to att is the sum of att (A,λ(A)) for A∈E1, and σ is invalid if λ is invalid with respect to att. This metric is referred to as qual (σ, att)
B. Instance Level Mapping For a valid schema embedding σ=(λ, path) from S1 to S2, the semantics are provided by defining an instance-level mapping σd:I(S1)→I(S2) referred to as the XML mapping of σ.
σd is defined by presenting an algorithm that, given an instance T1 of S1, computes an instance T2=σd(T1) of S2. Generally, σd constructs T2 top down starting from the root r2 of T2, mapped from the root r1 of T1 (recall λ(r1)=r2). Inductively, for each λ(A) element u in T2 that is mapped from an A element v in T, σd generates a distinct λ(B) node u′ in T2 for each distinct B child v′ of v in T1, such that u′ is reached from u via path (A,B) in T2, i.e., u′ is uniquely identified by the XR path from u. More specifically, the construction is based on the production A→P1(A) in S1 as follows.
(1) PA(A) is B1, . . . , Bn. For each child vi of v, σd creates a node ui bearing the same id as vi. These nodes are added to T2 as follows. For each i∈[1,n], ui is added to T2 by creating path (A, Bi) emanating from u to ui, such that the path shares any prefix already in T2 which were created for, e.g., path (A,Bj) for j<i.
(2) P1 (A) is B1+. . . +Bn. Here, v in T1 must have a unique child vi. For vi, σd creates a node ui bearing the same id as vi, and adds ui to T2 via path (A,Bi) as above.
(3) P1(A) is B* . By the definition of valid path function, path (A, B) is of form path (A, A1)/B1/path(B1,B), where A1 is the first type defined in terms of Kleene star in P2, i.e., P2(A1)=B*1. Let v1, . . . , vk be all the children of v. Then, σd creates u1, . . . , uk bearing the same id's as v1, . . . , vk, and adds these nodes to T2 as follows. It first generates a singe path (A, A1) from u to an A′ node u′ if it does not already exist in T2, and for each i∈[1,k], it creates a distinct i-th B1 child if it is not already in T2. From the i-th Bi node it generates path (B1,B) leading to ui, in the same way as in (1) above. Note that the order of the children of v is preserved by σd.
(4) P1(A) is str. Same as (1) except the last node of path (A,str) in T2 is a text node holding the same value as the text node in T1.
The process is repeated until all nodes in T1 are mapped to nodes in T2. σd(T) is completed by adding necessary default elements such that σd(T) conforms to S2. As previously indicated, consistent DTDs can be assumed without loss of generality. Thus, for each element type A in S2, a fixed instance IA of A can be selected and used as a default element of A.
Consider the XML mapping σd of the embedding defined above. Given an instance T1 of So of
For the category element w mapped from the type child t of c, σd creates a distinct path advanced/project under w if t has a project child, or a mandatory/regular path otherwise, but not both. The process proceeds until all nodes in T1 are mapped to T2. Finally, default elements of history, credit, year, term, instructor and gpa are added to T2 such that T2 conforms to S. At the last stage, no children of disjunctive types category, mandatory or advanced are added, and no children are created under history. That is, default elements are added only when necessary.
Note that σd (T1) does not have to be a new document of S constructed starting from scratch. Under certain conditions, a mild variation of σd allows an existing instance T2 of S to be expanded to accommodate nodes of T1 by modifying default elements in T2 and introducing new elements.
σd is well defined. That is, given any T1 in I(S1), σd(T1) is an XML tree that conforms to S2. This is nontrivial due to the interaction between different paths defined for disjunction types in the schema mapping σ among other things. Consider, for example, path(type, project) in the above embedding example. The path requires the existence of a regular child under a mandatory element m, which is in turn a child under a category element c in an instance of S. Thus, it rules out the possibility of adding an advanced child under c or a lab child under m perhaps requested by a conflicting path in σ. As discussed further below, however, the prefix-free condition in the definition of valid functions ensures that conflicting paths do not exist, and thus prevents violation caused by conflicting paths.
σd is infective. In other words, σd maps distinct nodes in T1 to distinct nodes in σd(T1), a property necessary for information preservation. Indeed, σ determines an injective path-mapping function δ such that, for each XR path p=A1[q1]/. . . /Ak[qk] in S1 from r1, δ(p) is path(r1,A1)[q1]/ . . . /path(Ak-1,Ak)[qk], an XR path in S2from r2, by substituting path (Ai, Ai+1) for each Ai+1 in p. Since each node in T1 is uniquely determined by an XR path from the root, it follows the σd is injective.
Thus, the XML mapping σd of a valid schema embedding σ:S1→S2 is well defined and injective.
C. Properties of Schema Embeddings
The XML mapping σd of a valid schema embedding C is guaranteed to type check. In addition, σd and σ also have all the other desired properties.
(1) Information Preservation
Information preservation is guaranteed by schema embeddings. Recall regular XPath XR.
The XML mapping σd of a valid schema embedding σ:S1→S2 is invertible and is query preserving with respect to XR. More precisely, (a) there exists an inverse σd−1 of σd that, given any σd(T), recovers T in O(|σd(T)|2) time; and (b) there is a query translation function F that given any XR query Q over S1, computes an XR query F(Q) equivalent with respect to σd over S2 in O(|Q∥σ∥S1|) time.
The XR query Q below, over S0 of
Q: class[cno/text( )=‘CS331’]/(type/regular/prereq/class)*.
Q′: courses/current/course[cno/text( )=‘CS331’]/(category/mandatory/regular/required/prereq/course)*.
In contrast, the notion of graph similarity ensures neither invertibility nor query preservation with respect to XR. As a simple example, the source and target schemas in
(2) Multiple Sources
In contrast to graph similarity, it is possible to embed multiple source DTD schemas to a single target DTD, as illustrated by the example below. This property is particularly useful in data integration. The embedding σ2=(λ2,path2) below maps S1 of
In general, given multiple source DTDs S1, . . . , Sn and a single target DTD S, one can define schema embeddings σi:Si→S to simultaneously map Si to S. Their XML mappings σd1, . . . , σdn are invertible and query preserving with respect to XR as long as δi, δj are pairwise disjoint, where δi is the path mapping function derived from σi to map paths XR from root in Si to XR paths from root in S. The instance-level XML mapping σd is a composition of individual σd1, . . . , σdn, such that σdi increments the document constructed by σdj's for j<i by modifying default elements or introducing new elements, as described earlier.
(3) Small Model Property
The result below provides an upper bound on the length |path(A,B)|, and allows the search space to be reduced when defining or finding an embedding.
If there exists a valid schema embedding σ:S1→S2, then there exists one such that for any edge (A,B) in S1,|path(A,B)|≦(k+1)|E2|, where S2=(E2,P2,r2), and k is the size of the production P2(A).
Computing Schema Embeddings
An XML schema embedding σ:S1→S2, that is valid with respect to the matrix att, is obtained from two input DTDs S1 and S2 and the matrix att if it exists.
A reasonable goal is to find an embedding σ:S1→S2 with as high a value for qual (σ, att) as possible. The ability to efficiently find good solutions to this problem will lead to an automated tool that, given two DTD schemas, computes candidate embeddings to recommend to users.
This problem is NP-complete. Its intractability is rather robust: it remains NP-hard for nonrecursive DTDs even when they are defined in terms of concatenation types only.
In light of the intractable results, two efficient yet accurate heuristic algorithms are provided for computing schema embedding candidates in the rest of the section.
A. Notations Recall that a schema embedding is a path mapping σ that is valid for each element type A in S1. Since the validity conditions for A involve only A's immediate children, it is useful to talk about mappings local to A. A local mapping for A is simply a partial path mapping (λo,patho) such that (a) λ0 and path0 are defined exactly on all the element types appearing in A's production A→P1(A), including A itself, and (b) it is valid, i.e., it satisfies the path type and prefix-free conditions given in the previous section.
Consider two partial mappings, σo=(λo,patho) and σ1=(λ1, path1). λo and λ1 conflict on A if both λo(A) and λ1(A) are defined, but λo(A)≠λ1(A), and similarly for patho and path1. σo and σ1 are consistent if they do not conflict, either on λ or path. The union of consistent partial mappings, denoted by σ1⊕σ1, is a partial embedding defined to be (λ1⊕λ2,path1 ⊕path 2), where
Similarly for path1(A,B)⊕ path2(A, B).
A technique is presented for finding local embeddings. Making use of this algorithm, three heuristics are then provided for finding embedding candidates. The first two are based on randomized programming and the last is by reduction from the problem to the Max-Weight-Independent-Set problem for which a well developed heuristic tool is available.
A. Finding Valid Local Mappings
An algorithm to find a local embedding σo=(λo, patho) is provided when the partial type mapping λo is fixed, as this is a key building block of the schema-embedding algorithms. This algorithm is then extended to handle the general case when λo is not given. To simplify the presentation, nonrecursive DTDs are discussed, i.e., DTDs with a directed acyclic graph (DAG) structure, but the disclosed technique also works on recursive (cyclic) DTDs, as would be apparent to a person of ordinary skill.
(1) Finding Valid Paths
Let A∈E1 be a source element type with production A→P1(A), in which the element types appearing in P1(A) are B1, . . . , Bk. Assume that the type mapping λo is already given as a partial function from E1 to E2 that is defined on B1, . . . , Bk and A. The Valid-Paths problem is to find paths patho(A,B1), . . . , patho(A,Bk) such that (λo, patho) is a valid local mapping for A.
The validity conditions stated above for embeddings require that (a) target paths for each edge are of the appropriate type (AND, OR, or STAR path), and (b) that the target path for an edge is not a prefix of a sibling's target path. The second condition is abstracted as a directed-graph problem: Given a directed graph G=(V, E), a source vertex s and a bag of target vertices Ltar={(t1. . . tk|}, find paths p1, . . . , pk such that no path is equal to or is the prefix of another. That is, for all i≠j,ρj≠ρi/ρij for any ρij including the empty path. In contrast to most sub-problems of schema-embedding, this can be solved in polynomial time. The solution is introduced by giving an algorithm that works only on a DAG and the solution is then extended below to handle cycles.
If line 5 (in which the algorithm returns early) and line 11 (in which nodes are marked to avoid revisiting them) are removed, the resulting algorithm considers every possible path leading to nodes in Ltar and assigns one path to each n∈Ltar. The resulting algorithm does not avoid assigning one node the prefix of another path. The prefix-free condition, however, is assured by the return at line 5 without affecting correctness, since a suffix of the path assigned to n could only be generated by continuing the recursion from this node.
In line 11, if no new target nodes were found in the subtree of a node when it was explored by the recursive calls of lines 7-10, then the current node will not be on any path to any n′ remaining in Ltar.
Consider the schema embedding problem shown in
To analyze the performance of the findPathsDAG algorithm 300, consider the traverse algorithm 400 as a sequence of forward and backward traversals of edges in the graph. A forward traversal occurs at line 9 and a backward traversal at lines 1, 5 and 12. Clearly, the number of forward traversals and backward traversals in a run are the same. Further, observe that one returns from an un-marked node at line 5 only on the path back from some node newly removed from Ltar. Thus, there can be at most |Ltar∥V| such backward steps, and at most |E| other backward steps (which mark the child of the edge traversed). Since G is a DAG, the algorithm 300 is in O(|Ltar∥V|) time.
To use the findPathsDAG algorithm 300 in the algorithms for schema embedding, the paths returned must match the types needed for n∈Ltar. That is accomplished as the type of a path can be maintained incrementally as it is lengthened and shortended (by storing counts of nodes of each type), and be checked at line 2.
(2) Schema Embeddings with a Given λA
This algorithm can be used to directly find a schema embedding σ=(λ,path) from S1 to S2 when the type mapping λ is a given total function from E1 to E2. As previously indicated, the validity conditions for any A in E1 involve only A's children; thus to find path, only valid paths need to be found for each A in E1 and take the union of these valid local embeddings. This yields an O(|S1∥S2|) algorithm to find embeddings in this special setting, which is not so uncommon since one may know in advance which target type a source type should map to, based on, e.g., machine-learning techniques.
(3) Handling Multiple Targets
To find valid local mappings when λ is not given, there are multiple possible target nodes for each source node. The general local-embedding problem is to find a local embedding (λo, patho) when λo may not be fixed. This problem is no longer tractable as shown below.
The local-embedding problem is NP-hard for nonrecursive DTDs.
One heuristic approach to finding local embeddings is to extend the findPathsDAG algorithm 300 as follows. The set of all pairings of source nodes A and possible matches for A are computed from att and passed as Ltar. Line 3 of the traverse algorithm 400 is modified to (a) pick an arbitrary pair with the current node as the target from Ltar at line 2 and (b) remove all pairs associated with source node A from Ltar at line 3. While this may work, it is essentially a greedy algorithm and may not find a solution if one exists. To compensate for this, a randomized variant findPathsRand (not shown) may be used which (a) picks a random source node associated with n at line 2 of the traverse algorithm 400, and (b) tries outgoing edges from n at line 7 in random order. The ability of findPathsRand to find embeddings varies with the size of Ltar.
(4) Handling Cycles
Schemas are frequently cyclic (recursive), and the algorithms as presented so far only handle DAGs. An arbitrary number of paths can be generated by repeated loops around some cycle on the path to a target, and careful use of these paths can guarantee the prefix-free property (
If there exists a valid schema embedding σ:S1-S2, then there exists one such that for any edge (A,B) in S1,|path(A,B)|≦(k+1)|E2|, where S2=(E2,P2,r2), and k is the size of the production P2(A).
B. Three Methods for Finding Schema Embeddings
Three heuristic embedding-search algorithms are discussed hereinafter, namely, QualityOrdered, RandomOrdered and RandomMaxlnd.
(1) Finding Solutions with Ordered Algorithms
The first two heuristics are based on an ordered subroutine 500, shown in
In a second variation, referred to as a RandomOrdered algorithm (not shown), C is the complete set of local embeddings discovered so far for each source node (lines 4 and 5 in
In a third variation, referred to as a RandomMaxlnd algorithm (not shown), the embedding is assembled from two DTDs S1 and S2, a similarity matrix att, and a table C. The RandomMaxInd algorithm generates a schema embedding σ:S1→S2 that is valid with respect to att, formed as the union of a subset of embeddings in C, if one exists.
The assemble-embedding problem is NP-hard for nonrecursive DTDs.
The RandomMaxlnd heuristic takes the approach of reducing the assemble-embeddings problem to the problem of finding high-weight independent sets in a graph. The RandomMaxlnd heuristic uses an existing heuristic solution, described in S. Busygin et al., “A Heuristic for the Maximum Independent Set Problem Based on Optimization of a Quadratic Over a Sphere, J. Comb. Optim., 6(3), 287-297 (2002), to produce partial or complete solutions to this problem, which can be used to create partial or complete embeddings.
Before describing the reduction, the definition of Max-Weight-Independent-Set is reviewed. That problem is defined on an undirected graph G=(V, E) (not to be confused with a schema graph) with node weights w[v], v∈V. The goal is to find a subset V′ of V such that for vi and vj in V′, there is no edge from vi to vj. In other words, (vi,vj)∉E and the weight of V′, defined as Σv∈V,w[v], is maximized.
Given an instance of the assemble-embedding problem, an instance of max-weight-independent-set can be constructed. First, for each local mapping σa∈C(A) for any A∈E1, a vertex vσ
To complete the algorithm on the resulting graph, an existing heuristic tool is used for Max-Weight-Independent-Set, which returns a subset V′ of V. Finally, an embedding σ is constructed by adding local embedding σa to σ for each vσ
If |V′|=|E1|, σ constructed as above is a schema embedding from S1 to S2.
If σ is not a full embedding, the findPathsRand algorithm is used to generate new local mappings, if any are available, for tags A not mapped by σ, and repeating the process until either it finds a valid embedding or it reaches a threshold of tries.
Prefix-Free Paths in Cyclic Graphs
The findPathsDAG algorithm 300, discussed above in conjunction with
The generalized algorithm has three parts: 1) break up the original graphs into a DAG of connected components, 2) solve this problem for the DAG case, 3) add back in the connected components, and 4) use the cycles found in these components to create prefix-free paths to nodes in the component or reachable therefrom. We now describe these steps in more detail.
A node n∈V is said to be in the shadow of ci if n can be reached in G by a node in ci. The target shadow of ci is the subset of Ltar in the shadow of ci. Note that a target node may be in the shadow of more than one component node. To continue with the discussion of the findpahts algorithm 700, the algorithm 700 at line 4-5 removes cyclic components and all nodes reachable from them from the component graph. For each cyclic node that contains a target node or from which a target node is reachable, a node for that component is added back to the graph as a new target node (along with nonredundant edges from nodes in ci). The idea is that the computed path to this node will be used as the prefix for all paths in that component or reachable therefrom. A bag L′tar is computed from Ltar by removing any target nodes no longer in the graph and adding any of the just-mentioned component nodes. Finally, for each component node ci with a non-empty target cycle, a new target set L′tar is created with target nodes, if any, in the shadow of ci, and a findpathCycle algorithm 800, shown in
In the algorithm 800, at line 2, a cycle, Y, is identified containing at least one node from Ltar ∩Ci, if such nodes exist. This cycle is used to provide non-prefix paths for each target node not in the shadow of ci but not in ci itself. In line 5, the notation “count trips around Y” means that the nodes of the cycle, starting with the last node in ρ, are added to the path, in order, then this is repeated “count” times. This is repeated for the case that ci is complex, and some target nodes remain in ci but not in the first Y chosen. Alternatively, a cycle could be found containing all the nodes from Ltar∩ci at line 1, but the paths produced would be even longer than the ones produced by the current algorithm. Finally, a search cannot be done for a simple (Hamiltonian) cycle with all the Ltar nodes in polynomial time.
System and Article of Manufacture Details
As is known in the art, the methods and apparatus discussed herein may be distributed as an article of manufacture that itself comprises a computer readable medium having computer readable code means embodied thereon. The computer readable program code means is operable, in conjunction with a computer system, to carry out all or some of the steps to perform the methods or create the apparatuses discussed herein. The computer readable medium may be a recordable medium (e.g., floppy disks, hard drives, compact disks, or memory cards) or may be a transmission medium (e.g., a network comprising fiber-optics, the world-wide web, cables, or a wireless channel using time-division multiple access, code-division multiple access, or other radio-frequency channel). Any medium known or developed that can store information suitable for use with a computer system may be used. The computer-readable code means is any mechanism for allowing a computer to read instructions and data, such as magnetic variations on a magnetic media or height variations on the surface of a compact disk.
The computer systems and servers described herein each contain a memory that will configure associated processors to implement the methods, steps, and functions disclosed herein. The memories could be distributed or local and the processors could be distributed or singular. The memories could be implemented as an electrical, magnetic or optical memory, or any combination of these or other types of storage devices. Moreover, the term “memory” should be construed broadly enough to encompass any information able to be read from or written to an address in the addressable space accessed by an associated processor. With this definition, information on a network is still within a memory because the associated processor can retrieve the information from the network.
It is to be understood that the embodiments and variations shown and described herein are merely illustrative of the principles of this invention and that various modifications may be implemented by those skilled in the art without departing from the scope and spirit of the invention.