Incomplete Information in Relational Temporal Databases

For the conventional relational model there has been considerable research in the area of incomplete information. On the other hand, research in temporal databases has concentrated on models in which complete historical information is needed. However, the likelihood of missing information in temporal databases is greater because of the vast amount of information. Hence, a mechanism must be provided to store and query incomplete temporal information. In this paper we present a model for incomplete information in temporal databases. The model generalizes our previous model for complete temporal information. It is shown that our relational operators produce results that are reliable. We also show, with some excentions. that if the definitions of the onerators were strengthened to give more information, we' may obtain results that are not reliable.

• Type: Conference
• Year: 1992
• Where: VLDB
• Authors: Shashi K. Gadia, Sunil S. Nair, Yiu-Cheong Poon
• Keywords: Database, Incomplete Information, Temporal Databases, Temporal Information, VLDB 1992