Technical Status Report - 96Q1 Ian Davis University of Waterloo Progress Report In the period April 1st - June 30 1995 we completed the initial DDL (120) and DML (150) design; made publically available (both as a technical report and via the Web) the paper entitled 'Text/Relational Database Management Systems: Overview and Proposed SQL Extensions' (195); presented this paper to the CAC SC21/WG3 SQL/MM Standards Committee as a discussion paper (140 and 170); developed agents to provide access via SQL2 commands to both Fulcrum and Open Text's text engines (340); extended the agent which communicated with Open Text's Pat engine so that it provided support for almost all of the proposed DML extensions (340); demonstrated our HQP to CSSC (320, 331, 341 and 395); and continued improvement of our software interfaces in preparation for the planned pre-release of our HQP, supporting software, documentation and ODBC libraries (320, 331, 341, 395) on schedule. We were actively involved in the Hybrid Query Processor Working Group meetings (195) which occurred April 3rd, May 4th, May 31st and June 27th. We hosted the CSSC Management Committee meeting on May 30th. We attended a SQL/MM Standards meeting on June 21st, and attended the first meeting of the Web Site Working Group on July 7th. We have begun to consider how we might implement extensions to our initial design which will allow us to provide access to relevant information embodied within the grammar of a text. Achievements The major progress in our (100) activities has been the acceptance (by CSSC) of a paper describing our proposed SQL DDL and DML extensions necessary to provide extensive support for structured text, development of software that proves the validity of these extensions, and the presentation of this paper (as a discussion paper) to a SQL/MM standards committee. The major progress in our (300) activities has been the development of an agent which translates SQL2 statements into SQL statements accepted by the Fulcrum Search Server engine (341), and a separate agent which translates SQL2 statements (including statements dependant on our proposed DML extensions) into the native language accepted by Open Text's Pat agent (341). We have integrated all of the components of our software with a text viewer (Lector), and have demonstrated to the CSSC Management Committee (and others) a rudimentary hybrid query processor (330B) accessible remotely through an ODBC interface. The demonstration of our HQP involved selecting, joining, and manipulating reasonable volumes of real world text and relational data. This demonstration showed that our HQP software behaved as a federated database engine; provided support for hybrid database tables whose columns could contain structured text; and used our proposed DML extensions to both mark text in context, and perform more elaborate operations such as transforming structured text into relations, selecting a subset of the resulting subtexts using conventional SQL predicates, and then marking where (within the original text) these selected subtexts occurred. The data used in this demonstration was distributed (across several Unix platforms) between Oracle V7.0, DB2/6000, Fulcrum's Search Server Engine, and Open Text's Pat Engine. Problem review We encountered no significant problems during the last quarter. We are currently involved in upgrading one of our platforms from SunOS 4.1.3 to Solaris 2.4 (SunOS 5.4) to better meet the needs of other members of CSSC, and are concurrently upgrading the version of DB2 which we are interfacing with. These activities will cause some very minor delay in providing a pre-release of our software. There is increasing interest in potentially using our HQP software within one or more of the scheduled Beta Trials. We intend to become actively involved in this statement of work, but given our limited resources (resulting in part from the assumption that we would not be involved in this activity or activities relating to it) anticipate the need for close involvement from other members of CSSC in integrating their Web Site or commercial beta trial applications with our HQP. There is a need to begin defining what it is we wish to demonstrate within the Beta Trials, and to begin prototyping software in anticipation of these Beta Trials. The directions taken by the CSSC management committee, the formation of the Web Site Working Group and the pre-release of HQP software are the appropriate immediate responses to this need. Coming events plan Weekly meetings of the research group within the University will continue throughout the next period. We will be presenting our proposed SQL extensions to the SQL/MM Rapporteur Group meeting in Ottawa July 26-27, 1995. The next meeting of the Web Site WG will be on Monday September 11th, 1995. The next meeting of the HQP WG is provisionally scheduled for October 12th, 1995. We have submitted a request to demonstrate our HQP software to CASCON'95 between November 7-9th, 1995. Project Status 6 110 Model Requirements [A] 94May01 94Sep30 100% 7 110 Model Requirements [B] 94Oct01 95Jan30 100% 18 120 DDL Design [A] 94Jan01 94Dec30 100% 19 120 DDL Design [B] 95Feb01 95Feb30 100% 20 120 DDL Design [C] 95Mar01 94Mar30 100% 22 131 DDL Interface Validator [A] 94Oct01 95Jan30 25% 23 131 DDL Interface Validator [B] 95Feb01 95Mar30 0% 33 140 DDL Specification [A] 95Jul01 95Dec30 10% 34 140 DDL Specification [B] 96Dec01 96Jun30 0% 42 150 DML Design [A] 94Jan01 94Jun30 100% 43 150 DML Design [B] 94Jul01 94Sep30 100% 44 150 DML Design finalised 94Oct01 95Jan30 100% 46 161 DML Interface Validator [A] 95Jan01 95Jun30 100% 47 161 DML Interface Validator [B] 95Jul01 96Jan31 0% 48 161 DML Interface Validator [C] 96Feb01 96Jun30 0% 49 161 DML Interface Validator [D] 96Jul01 96Dec30 0% 59 170 DML Specification 95Jul01 95Dec30 10% 60 170 DML Specification 96Jan01 96Jun30 0% 66 180 API Design [A] 94Oct01 94Dec30 100% 67 180 API Design [B] 95Jan01 95Sep30 100% 68 180 API Design [C] 95Oct01 95Dec30 0% 74 190 API Specification [A] 96Jan01 96Jun30 0% 75 190 API Specification [B] 96Jul01 96Dec30 0% 125 310 HQP Requirements [A] 94Oct01 95Jan01 100% 126 310 HQP Requirements [B] 95Jan01 95Mar30 100% 132 320 HQP Design [A] 94Jan01 94Dec30 100% 133 320 HQP Design [B] 95Jan01 95Mar30 100% 135 331 HQP Prototype [A] 94Jan01 94Jun30 100% 136 331 HQP Prototype [B] 94Jan01 95Jun30 98% 137 331 HQP Prototype [C] 95Jul01 96Jan31 0% 138 331 HQP Prototype [D] 96Feb01 96Jun30 0% 146 341 HQP/Agent Integration 94Sep01 95Jun30 80% 146 341 Agent/Oracle Integration 95Apr01 95Sep30 60% 341 Agent/DB2 Integration 95Apr01 95Sep30 60% 147 341 Agent/Fulcrum Integration 95Oct01 96Jun30 60% 148 341 Agent/Pat Integration 95Oct01 96Jun30 60% 900 Project Coordination 93Apr01 97Mar31 40% Ian Davis. July 10, 1995