Database Semantics Seminar

Master's Study Program in Computer Science

Advanced Databases (& Applications)

Prof Dr R Meersman —Spring Semester 2011

a.k.a. Database Semantics Seminar

Prerequisite knowledge: Information Systems (3rd Bachelor year)

Selected slides copies In PDF... —use these wisely... —last updated: March 2011

(including choice presentations by previous student teams)

click here ==> Advanced DB & Apps.ppt as PDF

2011 Schedule of individual presentations and subjects. If you are registered for this course but your name does not appear below with a topic, you may already have a problem :-)

—last updated: May 10, 2011

Please make your ppt slide material (and documentation sources, if not already in reader) available to me and to your opponent(s) at least one week before your presentation. As your presentations are 20 (twenty) minutes, followed by 10 (ten) minutes opposition and discussion, do not prepare more than 10-12 ppt slides!

Advice: in your presentation, do not dwell unnecessarily on undergraduate material that may be assumed known, such as the Relational Model or the syntax of XML... instead go straight to the topic and your argumentation

For open discussions and sending messages to the entire class, click: CLASS

For sending messages to me, click: HERE

Term synthesis papers. The (firm) deadline for the synthesis term papers in electronic form is on Sunday June 19, 2011 at 23h59. Please DO NOT MISS this deadline. Earlier submissions are strongly appreciated!

Each student must submit an individual paper (PLEASE deliver also a PRINTED version to my office or my lab in 10G730, not later than Tuesday June 21 at 18h00). The paper must treat his/her chosen subject as an extension of a "classical" database technology to be linked with (a) first order semantics as defined in Genesereth and Nilsson (Ch. 2), (b) the Reiter paper whenever appropriate, and/or discuss coherently why not.

Topics may also be chosen from book chapters and books mentioned below, or others negotiated with me. A typical synthesis paper will be 8-12 pages (single-spaced, 12pt), but this is not a hard limit.

Important: your text must use a self-defined running example to illustrate selected definitions and support arguments made. Do not use the examples from your sources. Please clearly list your sources (books, chapters, articles, web pages) at the start of your paper. The basic books and literature below need not be listed.

Grading: you will receive a combined mark for (a) your presentation, (b) your chosen opposition question(s), and of course (c) the quality of your synthesis term paper.

Basic books and literature used (loan copies available from lecturer)
M. Genesereth and N. Nilsson, "Logical Foundations of Artificial Intelligence", Morgan-Kaufmann —Chapters 1 and 2 only
R. Reiter, "Towards a Logical Reconstruction of Relational Database Theory" —copy available from lecturer
S. Abiteboul, R. Hull, V. Vianu, "Foundations of Databases", Addison-Wesley, 1995.

Recommended for topics (for some, loan copies available from lecturer)
C. Zaniolo (ed.), "Advanced Database Systems", Morgan-Kaufmann —Chapters on Deductive, Temporal, OO, and Multimedia databases
S. Abiteboul and D. Suciu, "Data on the Web- from Relations to Semistructured Data and XML", Morgan-Kaufmann —various chapters
Tansel et al, "Temporal Databases", Benjamin-Cummings, 1993
G. Alonso, F. Casati, et al. "Web Services", Springer-Verlag, 2004.
M. Jarke et al., "Fundamentals of Data Warehouses", Springer Verlag, 2000.
M.P. Papazoglou, G. Schlageter, "Cooperative Information Systems", Academic Press, 1998.
P.N. Tan, N. Steinbach, V. Kumar, "Introduction to Data Mining", Pearson Education, 2007.
S.S. Bhowmick, S.K. Madria, W.K. Ng, "Web Data Management", Springer Verlag, 2004.
J. Minker (ed.), "Deductive Databases and Logic Programming", Morgan-Kaufman, 1990. --selected chapters
R. Meersman, S. Stevens and Z. Tari (eds.), Semantic Issues in Multimedia Databases, Kluwer 1999. --selected papers
H. Stuckenschmidt, F. van Harmelen, "Information Sharing on the Semantic Web", Springer Verlag, 2005