tailieunhanh - Báo cáo khoa học: "NATURAL LANGUAGE DATABASE UPDATES"

Although a great deal of research effort has been expended in support of natural language (NL) database querying, little effort has gone to NL database update. One reason for this state of affairs is that in NL querying, one can tie nouns and stative verbs in the query to database objects (relation names, attributes and domain values). In many cases this correspondence seems sufficient to interpret NL queries. NL update seems to require database counterparts for active verbs, such as "hire," "schedule" and "enroll," rather than for stative entities. . | NATURAL LANGUAGE DATABASE UPDATES Sharon c. Salveter David Maier Computer Science Department SUNY Stony Brook Stony Brook NY 11794 ABSTRACT Although a great deal of research effort has been expended in support of natural language NL database querying little effort has gone to NL database update. One reason for this state of affairs is that ỉn NL querying one can tie nouns and statlve verbs in the query to database objects relation names attributes and domain values . In many cases this correspondence seems sufficient to Interpret NL queries. NL update seems to require database counterparts for active verbs such as hire schedule and enroll rather than for stative entities. There seem to be no natural candidates to fill this role. We suggest a database counterpart for active verbs which we call verbgraphs. The verbgraphs may be used to support NL update. A verbgraph is a structure for representing the various database changes that a given verb might describe. In addition to describing the variants of a verb they may be used to disambiguate the update command. Other possible uses of verbgraphs include specification of defaults prompting of the user to guide but not dictate user interaction and enforcing a variety of types of database integrity constraints. I. MOTIVIATION AND PROBLEM STATEMENT We want to support natural language Interface for all aspects of database manipulation. English and English-like query systems already exist such as ROBOT Ha77 TQA Da78 LUNAR WO76 and those described by Kaplan Ka79 Walker Wa78 and Waltz Wz75 . We propose to extend natural language interaction to include data modification insert delete modify rather than simply data extraction. Tne desirability and unavailability of natural language database modification has been noted by Wiederhold et al. W181J. Database systems currently do not contain structures for explicit modelling of real world changes. A state of a database DB Is meant to represent a state of a portion of the real world. .