Abstract
The concepts of validity and completeness are defined in terms of relationship between a correct representation of the real world and the representation of the real world which is stored in a database. Here a database is understood as a Relational database, that is, a set of atomic facts. It is assumed that some users can guarantee that some parts of the database are valid, and other parts are complete. From this information, for a given standard query, are characterized a subset of the answer to the standard query which is valid, and a superset of the answer which is complete. It is guaranteed that the correct answer is bounded up and down by these two sets.
We give a formal definition of these notions in the semantics. Then we present a sound axiomatics that can be used to define a Prolog program which computes answers to validity queries and completeness queries. The axiomatics is not complete because the definition of the non standard answers involves the notion of inclusion on Relational algebra formulas. If some strong restrictions on the completeness of the axiomatics are imposed the program always terminates.
I am quite grateful to Laurence Cholvy whose valuable comments helped me to improve the quality of this paper. This work has been partially suported by the CEC, in the context of the Basic Research Action MEDLAR 2.
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References
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© 1996 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg
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Demolombe, R. (1996). Validity queries and completeness queries. In: Raś, Z.W., Michalewicz, M. (eds) Foundations of Intelligent Systems. ISMIS 1996. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 1079. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-61286-6_150
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-61286-6_150
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