Essential Performance Drivers in Native XML DBMSs
As a multi-layered XML database management system, we have designed, implemented, and optimized over the recent five years our prototype system XTC, a native XDBMS providing multi-lingual query interfaces (XQuery, XPath, DOM). In particular in higher system layers, we have compared competing concepts and iteratively found salient solutions which drastically improved the overall XDBMS performance. XML query processing is critically affected by the smooth interplay of concepts and methods on all architectural layers: node labeling and mapping options for storage structures; availability of suitable index mechanisms; provision of a spectrum of path processing operators; query language compilation and optimization. Furthermore, effective and efficient locking protocols must be present to guarantee the ACID properties for XML processing and to achieve high transaction throughput. 
 
In this survey, we outline our experiences gained during the implementation and optimization of XTC. We figure out the "key drivers" to maximize throughput while keeping the response times at an acceptable level. Because we have implemented all options and alternatives in XTC, dedicated benchmark runs allow for comparisons in identical environments and illustrate the benefit of all implementation decisions.

title: Green Computing - A Case for Data Caching and Flash Disks?
abstract: Green computing or energy saving when processing information is primarily considered a task of processor development. However, this position paper advocates that a holistic approach is necessary to reduce power consumption to a minimum. We discuss the potential of integrating NAND flash memory into DB-based architectures and its support by adjusted DBMS algorithms governing IO processing. The goal is to drastically improve energy efficiency while comparable performance as is disk-based systems is maintained.

title: An Adaptive Storage Manager for XML Documents
abstract: Effective and efficient management and manipulation of XML documents requires stable decisions at the time a document enters the XML DBMS to provide for storage structures which are adjusted to the document characteristics and which reflect the future processing needs. While some of the critical parameters require a kind of pre-specification, others can be determined by pre-analysis or sampling of the incoming document or by just making experience-driven “educated guesses”. Important parameters are related to node labeling, path synopsis, document container layout, and indexing. In this paper, we discuss approaches to achieve an adaptive behavior of the storage manager to provide tailor-made native XML storage structures to the extent possible.

title: Tailor-Made Native XML Storage Structures
abstract: Automatically choosing suitable native storage structures for XML doc- uments arriving at the XML DBMS is a challenging task for its storage manager. While some of the critical parameters require pre-specification, others can be deter- mined by pre-analysis or sampling of the incoming document or by just making ex- perience-driven "educated guesses". In this paper, we discuss approaches to achieve an adaptive behavior of the storage manager to provide tailor-made native XML stor- age structures to the extent possible. 1I ntroduction The XML data model allows for a great deal of modeling flexibility with which order, op- tional and multi-valued concepts, as well as deeply nested relationships can be captured. Therefore, the resulting tree structures of natively represented XML documents exhibit large variations in breadth and depth. Furthermore, XML documents may be data-centric having relatively little 'content' stored as short text values or they may be document-cen- tric where a single content node may contain huge portions of text, e.g., an entire book in a digital library. For these reasons, it is highly advisable to equip the storage manager with the ability to select reasonable or even optimal storage structures for documents. Furthermore, two cas- es have to be considered: a document sent by a client arrives at a time—the so-called block mode, i.e., the document can be pre-parsed and analyzed before a storage structure is cho- sen—or it arrives at the DBMS interface in stream mode where fragments present, due to their size, have to be allocated in a suitable storage structure on disk before the entire "streamed" document is available for the DBMS. In the latter case, the storage manager must decide—based on imprecise structural information—on the storage structure to be chosen and, at best, can make some educated guesses based on context or sampling infor- mation.

title: The promise of solid state disks: increasing efficiency and reducing cost of DBMS processing
abstract: Most database systems (DBMSs) today are operating on servers equipped with magnetic disks. In our contribution, we want to motivate the use of two emerging and striking technologies, namely native XML DBMSs (XDBMSs for short) and solid state disks. In this context, the traditional read/write model optimized by a sophisticated cache hierarchy and the IO cost model for databases needs adjustment. Such new devices together with optimized storage mapping of XML documents provide a number of challenging characteristics. We discuss howtheir optimization potential ca be exploited to enhance transactional DB performance under reduced energy consumption to match increasing application demands and, at the same time, to guarantee economic energy use in data centers.

title: Adaptive Resource Management in a Native XDBMS
abstract: A graphite reinforced glass composite is described comprising discontinuous graphite fibers in substantially planar orientation in a glass matrix with strength and fracture toughness greater than the unreinforced glass matrix. The resulting composite has superior strength, fluid impermeability, wear resistance, failure strain and fracture toughness. In fact, the stress-strain, curve for composites of the invention resembles that of metal making it particularly suitable for a variety of moldable shapes and machinable designs.

title: LoLA wird Pfadfinder.
abstract: LoLA ist ein erreichbarkeitsgraphbasiertes Werkzeug f ur Stellen/Transitions{Netze. Hier geht es um LoLAs Fahigkeit, erreichbare Zustande mit vorgegebenen Eigenschaften zu suchen und im Erfolgsfall einen solchen Zustand mit einem Weg von der Anfangsmarkierung dorthin anzugeben. Die Besonderheit besteht darin, da wahrend der Suche nur zwei Zustande gespeichert werden: der Anfangszustand und der aktuelle Zustand. Anstatt also den Zustandsraum systematisch zu durchmustern (und dabei meist am Speicherende zu scheitern), navigiert LoLA ohne Kenntnis der schon betretenen Zustande durch den Erreichbarkeitsgraph. Da sie trotzdem ihre Aufgabe erfolgreich lost, liegt an ihren spezi schen Fahigkeiten: Schnelligkeit, Bescheidenheit, Zielstrebigkeit, Neugier und Ausdauer.

title: Verification of Siphons and Traps for Algebraic Petri Nets
abstract: Siphons and traps are structures which allow for some implications on the net's behaviour and can be used in manual correctness proofs for concurrent systems. We introduce symbolic representations of siphons and traps which work quite well even in infinite cases and are still intuitively readable. The verification of symbolic siphons and traps is traced back to unification and structural induction on the terms. This approach is motivated by some additional considerations. For unification and other proposed structural reasoning mechanisms tool support is given by completeness proof tools studied in the theorem-proving community.

title: Narrowing Petri Net State Spaces Using the State Equation
abstract: Given a (possibly partially defined) state, all count vectors of transition sequences reaching that state are solutions to a corresponding Petri net state equation. We propose a search strategy where sequences corresponding to a minimal solution of the state equation are explored first. Then step by step the search space is relaxed to arbitrary count vectors. This heuristics relies on the observation that in many (though provably not in all) cases, minimal solutions of the state equation can be realized as a firing sequence. If no target state is reachable, either the state equation does not have solutions, or our search method would yield the full state space. We study the impact of the state equation on reachability, present an algorithm that exploits information from the state equation and discuss its application in stateless search as well as its combination with stubborn set reduction.

title: How to calculate symmetries of Petri nets
abstract: Symmetric net structure yields symmetric net behaviour. Thus, knowing the symmetries of a net, redundant calculations can be skipped. We present a framework for the calculation of symmetries for several net classes including place/transition nets, timed nets, stochastic nets, self–modifying nets, nets with inhibitor arcs, and many others. Our approach allows the specification of different symmetry groups. Additionally it provides facilities either to calculate symmetries on demand while running the actual analysis algorithm, or to calculate them in advance. For the latter case we define and calculate a ground set of symmetries. Such a set has polynomial size and is sufficient for an efficient implementation of the for all symmetries loop and the partition of net elements into equivalence classes. These two constructions are the usual way to integrate symmetries into an analysis algorithm.

title: Automated Generation of a Progress Measure for the Sweep-Line Method
abstract: In the context of Petri nets, we propose an automated construction of a progress measure which is an important pre-requisite for a state space reduction technique called the sweep-line method. Our construction is based on linear-algebraic considerations concerning the transition vectors of the Petri net under consideration.