A form-based query interface for complex queries

El-Mahgary, Sami; Soisalon-Soininen, Eljas

doi:10.1016/j.jvlc.2015.03.001

Cited by 5 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 73 publications

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“…Based on a subset of references in surveys by Catarci et al [22], El-Mahgary and Soisalon-Soininen [37], and Bakke and Karger [9]. .…”

Section: Contentsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Visual query systems have been surveyed by Catarci et al [22] and, recently, El-Mahgary and Soisalon-Soininen [37]. Systems discussed in this section include, in particular, those that employ direct manipulation, nested results, or optimizations for traversing relationships in the database.…”

Section: Visual Query Systemsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…From the earliest days of relational database research, it was recognized that textual query languages such as QUEL and SEQUEL (later SQL), while useful in application development, would not by themselves serve as an effective user interface for non-programmers. Starting with CUPID [75] and Query-by-Example [111], again from Berkeley and IBM Research in the mid-70s, the subfield of visual query systems began to grow in parallel with the more storage-and [22], El-Mahgary and Soisalon-Soininen [37], and Bakke and Karger [9].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Expressive Query Construction through Direct Manipulation of Nested Relational Results

Bakke

Karger

2016

Proceedings of the 2016 International Conference on Management of Data

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Despite extensive research on visual query systems, the standard way to interact with relational databases remains to be through SQL queries and tailored form interfaces. This makes the power of relational databases largely inaccessible to non-programmers. This thesis proposes a solution, in two parts.The first contribution of this thesis is a solution to the visual query language problem, that is, the problem of letting end users construct arbitrary database queries through a graphical user interface. We propose the first visual query language to simultaneously satisfy three requirements: (1) query specification through direct manipulation of results, (2) the ability to view and modify any part of the current query without departing from the direct manipulation interface, and (3) SQL-like expressiveness. By directly manipulating nested relational results, and using spreadsheet idioms such as formulas and filters, the user can express arbitrary SQL-92 queries while always remaining able to track and modify the state of the complete query.The second contribution of this thesis is an algorithm for automatically formatting nested relational data using the traditional visual idioms of hand-designed database UIs: tables, multi-column forms, and outline-style indented lists. The algorithm plugs directly into the output stage of our visual query language, and produces the concrete graphics that the user sees and manipulates on the screen during query construction. The algorithm eliminates the need for an application developer to specify low-level presentation details such as label placements, text field dimensions, table column widths, and list styles.Our prototype visual query system gives the user an experience of responsive, incremental query building while pushing all actual query processing to the database layer. We evaluate the query building aspects of our system with formative and controlled user studies on a total of 28 spreadsheet users. The controlled study shows our system outperforming Microsoft Access by 18 points on the System Usability Scale [17]; this corresponds to a 46 percentage point difference on a percentile scale of other studies in the Business Software category. We also evaluate the different layouts that can be produced by our automatic layout algorithm, including via an online user study on 27 subjects.

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“…Based on a subset of references in surveys by Catarci et al [22], El-Mahgary and Soisalon-Soininen [37], and Bakke and Karger [9]. .…”

Section: Contentsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Visual Query Systemsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

Expressive Query Construction through Direct Manipulation of Nested Relational Results

Bakke

Karger

2016

Proceedings of the 2016 International Conference on Management of Data

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“…OVI-3 is the culmination of some new ideas to improve on a previous VQS, OVI-2, short for Oodi's Visual Interface (El-Mahgary & Soisalon-Soininen, 2015) that was successfully used for several years by academic counsellors to perform ad-hoc queries on Aalto University's student database, known as Oodi. The '2' in the name OVI-2 is not a version number (there never was an OVI-1) but rather denotes the fact that OVI-2 used a two-stage querying.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

OVI-3: A NoSQL visual query system supporting efficient anti-joins

et al. 2022

Self Cite

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The aim of this work was to develop a technique to speed up complex joins in an incremental visual query system. When designing a visual, highly interactive interface for ad-hoc (read-only) queries, fast response times are of paramount importance. While a column-oriented DBMS reduces the inherent latency found in relational DBMS, there is still the question of how to index the data, especially so as to support complex joins. Equi-joins that involve a many-to-many relationship are an example of complex joins that arise frequently and whose efficient processing is essential for fast query processing. We present OVI-3, a NoSQL visual query system based on incremental querying that uses a simple directory-based indexing scheme for faster processing of such complex joins. The system has been piloted using real data from a student database at Aalto University. The results demonstrated that for certain complex joins the presented indexing scheme outperforms SQL queries from a data server, especially for queries involving anti-joins (negation), where OVI-3 provided an orders of magnitude speed improvement.

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“…Although the basic syntax of SQL is easy to understand, specifying queries that use complex constructs is a non-trivial task. That is, whenever a query has at least one of the following constructs, it can be considered complex, and will therefore require greater intellectual and technical effort: 1) subquery (correlated or non-correlated) [Czejdo et al 1993, Kawash 2004, Zhang et al 1999, Catarci and Santucci 1995; 2) join (Cross, Natural, Inner, or Outer) [Catarci and Santucci 1995]; 3) set operation (Union, Except, and Intersect) [El-Mahgary and Soisalon-Soininen 2015]; 4) conditional expression (Case clause) [Gryz et al 2008]; and 5) grouping restriction (Having clause) [Zhang et al 1999].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Mental Workload Impact of a Visual Language on Understanding SQL Queries

Silva¹,

Franco²,

Ferro³

et al. 2019

Anais Do XXX Simpósio Brasileiro De Informática Na Educação (SBIE 2019)

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Structured Query Language (SQL) is an essential topic in introductory database courses. Despite its declarative syntax, SQL query specification can be confusing. Visual Query Languages (VQLs) are an alternative to reduce this complexity. However, these VQLs do not cover many complex constructions. To overcome this limitation, we present the Diagrammatic SQL (DSQL). Because increased Mental Workload (MW) during task performance may increase fatigue and facilitate errors, our objective is to investigate the MW impact of DSQL on the understanding of SQL queries. In this experiment, we compare the accuracy, time, and ease-of-understanding complex queries using both languages. The results indicate that there is no significant difference.

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A form-based query interface for complex queries

Cited by 5 publications

References 73 publications

Expressive Query Construction through Direct Manipulation of Nested Relational Results

Expressive Query Construction through Direct Manipulation of Nested Relational Results

OVI-3: A NoSQL visual query system supporting efficient anti-joins

Mental Workload Impact of a Visual Language on Understanding SQL Queries

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