Rewriting queries using views in description logics

Abstract

The problem of rewriting queries using views is to find a query expression that uses only a set of views V and is equivalent to (or maximally contained in) a given query Q. Rewriting queries using views is important for query optimization and for applications such as information integration and data warehousing. Description logics are a family of logics that were developed for modeling complex hierarchical structures, and can also be viewed as a query language with an interesting tradeoff between complexity and expressive power. We consider the problem of rewriting queries using views expressed in description logics and conjunctive queries over description logics. We show that if the view definitions do not contain existential variables, then it is always possible to find a rewriting that is a union of conjunctive queries, and furthermore, this rewriting produces the maximal set of answers possible from the views. If the views have existential variables, the rewriting may be recursive. We present an algorithm for producing a recursive rewriting, that is guaranteed to be a maximal one when the underlying database forms a tree of constants. We show that in general, it is not always be possible to find a maximal rewriting.