Modeling and language support for the management of pattern-bases

Information overloading is today a serious concern that may hinder the potential of modern web-based information systems. A promising approach to deal with this problem is represented by knowledge extraction methods able to produce artifacts (also called patterns) that concisely represent data. Patterns are usually quite heterogeneous and voluminous. So far, little emphasis has been posed on developing an overall integrated environment for uniformly representing and querying different types of patterns. In this paper we consider the larger problem of modeling, storing, and querying patterns, in a database-like setting and use a Pattern-Base Management System (PBMS) for this purpose. Specifically, (a) we formally define the logical foundations for the global setting of pattern management through a model that covers data, patterns, and their intermediate mappings; (b) we present a formalism for pattern specification along with safety restrictions; and (c) we introduce predicates for comparing patterns and query operators.