Row Types in SQL-3

Row types define types for tuples, and they can be nested.

CREATE ROW TYPE AddressType{

street CHAR(50),
city CHAR(25),
zipcode CHAR(10)
}

CREATE ROW TYPE PersonType{

name CHAR(30),
address AddressType,
phone phoneNumberType
}
 Relations as Row Types
CREATE TABLE Person OF TYPE PersonType;

Recall: row types can be nested!

Accessing components of a row type: (double dots)

SELECT Person.name, Person.address..city

FROM Person

WHERE Person.address..street LIKE ‘%Mountain%’

 References
We can define attributes of a row type to reference objects of other
row types:

CREATE ROW TYPE Company(

name char(30),
address addressType,
president REF(PersonType)
);
Following references:

SELECT president->name
FROM Company
WHERE president->address..city=“Seattle”
 Abstract Data Types in SQL3
• Row types provide a lot of the functionality of objects:

• allow us to modify objects (unlike OQL), but

• do not provide encapsulation.
• We can modify objects arbitrarily using SQL3 commands.
• In OQL: we can query, but not modify only via methods.

• Abstract data types: are used as components of tuples.

CREATE TYPE <type name> (

list of attributes and their types
optional declaration of the comparison functions: =, <
declaration of methods for the type
);
 Address ADT
CREATE TYPE AddressADT (
street CHAR(50),
city CHAR(20),
EQUALS addrEq,
LESS THAN addrLT

FUNCTION fullAddr (a: AddressADT) RETURNS CHAR(100);

:z CHAR(10);
BEGIN
:z = findZip(:a.street, :a.city);
RETURN (….)
END;
DECLARE EXTERNAL findZip
CHAR(50) CHAR(20) RETURNS CHAR(10)
LANGUAGE C; );
Encapsulation is obtained by making methods public/private
 Differences Between OODB
Approaches
• Programming environment: much more closely coupled in
OQL/ODL than in SQL3.

• Changes to objects are done via the programming language in

OQL, and via SQL statements in SQL3.

• Role of relations: still prominent in SQL 3

• Row types are really tuples, ADT’s describe attributes.
• In OQL: sets, bags and structures are fundamental.

• Encapsulation: exists in OQL; not really supported by row types

in SQL3, but are supported by ADT’s.
 Transitive Closure
Suppose we are representing a graph by a relation Edge(X,Y):

Edge(a,b), Edge (a,c), Edge(b,d), Edge(c,d), Edge(d,e)

a d e
c

I want to express the query:

Find all nodes reachable from a.

 Recursion in Datalog
Path( X, Y ) :- Edge( X, Y )
Path( X, Y ) :- Path( X, Z ), Path( Z, Y ).

Semantics: evaluate the rules until a fixedpoint:

Iteration #0: Edge: {(a,b), (a,c), (b,d), (c,d), (d,e)}

Path: {}
Iteration #1: Path: {(a,b), (a,c), (b,d), (c,d), (d,e)}

Iteration #2: Path gets the new tuples:

(a,d), (b,e), (c,e)
Iteration #3: Path gets the new tuple:
(a,e)
Iteration #4: Nothing changes -> We stop.
Note: number of iterations depends on the data. Cannot be
anticipated by only looking at the query!
 Deductive Databases
We distinguish two types of relations in our database:
• Extensional relations (EDB): their extent is stored in the
database just like in ordinary relational databases.
• Intentional relations (IDB): their extension is defined by
a set of possibly recursive datalog rules.

Intentional relations can either be materialized or computed

on demand.

Note: a query and a definition of an intentional predicate look

exactly the same (I.e., they’re both datalog programs).

Hard problem: how do we optimize queries in the presence of

recursion.
Harder problem: do we really need recursion?
 Recursion in SQL-3
Limited forms of recursion are considered important.
Linear recursion: only 1 occurrence of a recursive predicate
in the body
Path( X, Y ) :- Edge( X, Y )
Path( X, Y ) :- Edge( X, Z ), Path( Z, Y ).
WITH
Pairs AS SELECT origin, dest FROM EDGE

RECURSIVE Path(origin, dest) AS

Pairs
UNION
(SELECT Pairs.origin, Path.to
FROM Pairs, Path
WHERE Pairs.to = Path.origin)
SELECT * FROM Path;