Data exchange is the problem of transforming data structured under a source schema into data structured under a different target schema, where the relationship between the source and the target is given by high-level specifications called schema mappings. The data exchange problem arises in several different areas of database management systems including information integration and peer-to-peer data management systems.
Earlier foundational work on data exchange focused on relational data exchange settings. One of the main goals of this project is to investigate issues of semantics and query answering for richer data exchange frameworks in which the exchange takes place between semistructured or XML data. Another main goal is to study certain key problems arising in metadata management including the problem of composing several consecutive schema mappings and the problem of inverting a given schema mapping. A final goal is to develop a test bed for comparing data exchange tools and evaluating schema mapping techniques.
This project will advance the state of the art in the areas of data exchange and metadata management. Dissemination of results will be achieved through publication in scholarly journals and conferences and incorporation in an advanced topics course on database systems. In addition the data exchange test bed will be made publicly available on the Web for wider dissemination and sharing.
