An index allocation tool for object-oriented database systems
The problem of index configuration is an important topic for database system performance and has been extensively investigated for relational Database Management Systems (DBMS). By contrast, the problem of index allocation for Object-Oriented DBMS (OODBMS) has been considered only from a theoretical point of view and no practical development of any tool for commercial OODBMS has been reported. In this paper, we investigate the problem of index configuration in the framework of a commercially available OODBMS. We first identify the features that characterize such OODBMS and we develop two cost models: the first extends the generic cost model presented by Gardarin et al. (), the second is an analytical cost model tailored to the OODBMS at hand. Both cost models have been validated by comparing the estimated costs and the actual costs observed from the system. The comparison has shown that both models are quite accurate. Using the proposed cost models, we have also developed an algorithm for the efficient index allocation on a given path, given a workload specified in terms of operation frequencies. Even though our algorithm has been developed for a specific OODBMS, we believe that it can be easily tailored to other OODBMS and persistent programming languages.

title: An Extended Algebra for Constraint Databases
abstract: Constraint relational databases use constraints to both model and query data. A constraint relation contains a finite set of generalized tuples. Each generalized tuple is represented by a conjunction of constraints on a given logical theory and, depending on the logical theory and the specific conjunction of constraints, it may possibly represent an infinite set of relational tuples. For their characteristics, constraint databases are well suited to model multidimensional and structured data, like spatial and temporal data. The definition of an algebra for constraint relational databases is important in order to make constraint databases a practical technology. We extend the previously defined constraint algebra (called generalized relational algebra). First, we show that the relational model is not the only possible semantic reference model for constraint relational databases and we show how constraint relations can be interpreted under the nested relational model. Then, we introduce two distinct classes of constraint algebras, one based on the relational algebra, and one based on the nested relational algebra, and we present an algebra of the latter type. The algebra is proved equivalent to the generalized relational algebra when input relations are modified by introducing generalized tuple identifiers. However, from a user point of view, it is more suitable. Thus, the difference existing between such algebras is similar to the difference existing between the relational algebra and the nested relational algebra, dealing with only one level of nesting. We also show how external functions can be added to the proposed algebra.

title: An Approach to Authorization Modeling in Object-Oriented Database Systems
abstract: Authorization is an important functionality that every data management system should provide. An authorization mechanism allows different access rights on data items to be selectively assigned to users. Authorization models and mechanisms have been widely investigated in the framework of traditional database systems. The extension of those models and mechanisms to advanced data management systems is quite complex, because those systems are characterized by data models with a larger number of semantic constructs than traditional models, like the relational one. A first authorization model defined for object-oriented (and semantic) database systems has been presented in . In this paper we present an authorization model that substantially extends and revises that model. The most significant extension concerns the support for content-dependent authorization, which was not provided in . Content-dependent authorization is very important in providing an authorization mechanism able to directly support authorization policies of application environments. Moreover, it is a crucial functionality in environments where data objects frequently change their status. In addition, the model presented here differs from the model defined in [20] in that new authorization types are introduced and a finer control of versions is provided. Finally, authorization administration of objects is considered.

title: Index Configurations in Object-Oriented Databases

title: An approach to model and query event-based temporal data
abstract: Temporal database systems support all functions related to the management of large amounts of constantly changing data. However, current temporal database systems support a flat view of the history of data changes, in that all the changes are considered equally relevant and are, therefore, all stored in the database. However, many applications, such as monitoring and planning applications, call for more flexibility. Monitoring applications, in particular, may require that the history of a data item is stored only whenever a certain event occurs. For other applications, the history of data changes may be less important than the event causing the changes. In this paper, we propose an event-based temporal object model which allows us to keep track of selected values within the history of a data object attribute. The portions within the history of a data object which are actually stored in the database are identified by relating them to events. In the paper, besides defining the data model, we investigate the problem of querying a database with incomplete temporal information.

title: Extending the ODMG Object Model with Time
abstract: Although many temporal extensions of the relational data model have been proposed, there is no comparable amount of work in the context of object-oriented data models. Moreover, extensions to the relational model have been proposed in the framework of SQL standards, whereas no attempts have been made to extend the standard for objectoriented databases, defined by ODMG. This paper presents T_ODMG, a temporal extension of the ODMG-93 standard data model. The main contributions of this work are, thus, the formalization of the ODMG standard data model and its extension with time. Another contribution of this work is the investigation, on a formal basis, of the main issues arising from the introduction of time in an object-oriented model.

title: Access control enforcement for conversation-based web services
abstract: Service Oriented Computing is emerging as the main approach to build distributed enterprise applications on the Web. The widespread use of Web services is hindered by the lack of adequate security and privacy support. In this paper, we present a novel framework for enforcing access control in conversation-based Web services. Our approach takes into account the conversational nature of Web services. This is in contrast with existing approaches to access control enforcement that assume a Web service as a set of independent operations. Furthermore, our approach achieves a tradeoff between the need to protect Web service's access control policies and the need to disclose to clients the portion of access control policies related to the conversations they are interested in. This is important to avoid situations where the client cannot progress in the conversation due to the lack of required security requirements. We introduce the concept of k-trustworthiness that defines the conversations for which a client can provide credentials maximizing the likelihood that it will eventually hit a final state.

title: Systematic control and management of data integrity
abstract: Integrity has long been considered a fundamental requirement for secure computerized systems, and especially today's demand for data integrity is stronger than ever as many organizations are in-creasing their reliance on data and information systems. A number of recently enacted data privacy regulations also require high in-tegrity for personal data. In this paper, we discuss various issues concerning systematic control and management of data integrity with a primary focus on access control. We first examine some previously proposed integrity models and define a set of integrity requirements. We then present an architecture for comprehensive integrity control systems, which has its basis on data validation and metadata management. We also provide an integrity control policy language that we believe is flexible and intuitive.

title: Controlled and cooperative updates of XML documents in byzantine and failure-prone distributed systems
abstract: This paper proposes an infrastructure and related algorithms for the controlled and cooperative updates of XML documents. Key components of the proposed system are a set of XML-based languages for specifying access-control policies and the path that the document must follow during its update. Such path can be fully specified before the update process begins or can be dynamically modified by properly authorized subjects while being transmitted. Our approach is fully distributed in that each party involved in the process can verify the correctness of the operations performed until that point on the document without relying on a central authority. More importantly, the recovery procedure also does not need the participation of a central authority. Our approach is based on the use of some special control information that is transmitted together with the document and a suite of protocols. We formally specify the structure of such control information and the protocols. We also analyze security and complexity of the proposed protocols.

title: Privacy preserving schema and data matching
abstract: In many business scenarios, record matching is performed across different data sources with the aim of identifying common information shared among these sources. However such need is often in contrast with privacy requirements concerning the data stored by the sources. In this paper, we propose a protocol for record matching that preserves privacy both at the data level and at the schema level. Specifically, if two sources need to identify their common data, by running the protocol they can compute the matching of their datasets without sharing their data in clear and only sharing the result of the matching. The protocol uses a third party, and maps records into a vector space in order to preserve their privacy. Experimental results show the efficiency of the matching protocol in terms of precision and recall as well as the good computational performance.