Patent ID: 7310639

Claim:
A computer-implemented method of providing query attributes to facilitate query composition, comprising: specifying a correlation attribute for one or more logical field definitions defined in a data abstraction model that logically models physical data, each correlation attribute having a definition for determining a corresponding correlation condition; wherein each of the definitions comprise: a logical field name; at least one location attribute identifying a location of physical data corresponding to the logical field name; and a reference to an access method selected from at least two different access method types, wherein each of the different access methods types defines a different manner of exposing the physical data corresponding to the logical field name of the respective logical field definition; wherein the correlation attributes, when present in an abstract query referencing one or more of the logical field definitions and one or more correlation attributes, configure a query processor to dynamically add query logic to a query generated from the abstract query on the basis of the referenced correlation attributes and the corresponding logical fields for which the correlation attributes are specified, the query logic comprising the correlation conditions corresponding to the referenced correlation attributes, whereby additional constraints are placed on queries on the basis of user-specified query conditions without requiring user composition of the corresponding query logic defining the additional constraints.