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A theory for rule triggering systems

  • Session II: Rules
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Advances in Database Technology — EDBT '90 (EDBT 1990)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNCS,volume 416))

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Abstract

We define and study the family of RTS's, each appearing in the form of a relational database extended with a set of production-like rules with forward-chained operational semantics.

The syntax and operational semantics of RTS's are first defined, which provide a simple model for rule triggering systems. Operationally rules behave like concurrent processes which update the database's state. A computation of a RTS is then a sequence of states induced by firing rules in some order, which terminates in a fixed point. When a RTS has more than one rule, there may be multiple computations from the same state, and they may terminate in different fixed points.

The RTS's that have determinate computational behavior are identified as those computing unique fixed points. We give an easy-to-check sufficient condition that detects RTS's that may fail to belong to this class.

This work is supported in part by the US Department of Navy, Space and Naval Warfare Systems Command and Defense Advance Research Projects agency under contract N00038-88-@-0163, and the National Science Foundation under grant NSF-44-782-10-7687-2-30

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Aiken Computation Laboratory, Harvard University, 02138, Cambridge, MA

    Yuli Zhou & Meichun Hsu

Authors
  1. Yuli Zhou
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  2. Meichun Hsu
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Editor information

François Bancilhon Constantino Thanos Dennis Tsichritzis

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© 1990 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg

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Zhou, Y., Hsu, M. (1990). A theory for rule triggering systems. In: Bancilhon, F., Thanos, C., Tsichritzis, D. (eds) Advances in Database Technology — EDBT '90. EDBT 1990. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 416. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/BFb0022186

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BFb0022186

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-540-52291-1

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-540-46948-3

  • eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive

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