Building a unified query that spans heterogeneous environments

• US 7,702,625 B2
• Filed: 03/03/2006
• Issued: 04/20/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 03/03/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: X Corp. (f/k/a Twitter, Inc.) (X Holdings Corp.)
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Peterson, Trenten, Singh, Hardeep
• Primary Examiner(s): Trujillo; James
• Assistant Examiner(s): Casanova; Jorge A
• Application Number:
  US11/368,293
• Publication Number:
  US 20070208723A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,509 Days
• Field of Search: 707/3, 707/4
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/2471 Distributed queries
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/256 in federated or virtual databases
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/80 of semi-structured data, e.g. markup language structured data such as SGML, XML or HTML content-based retrieval of web data G06F16/95
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99934 Query formulation, input preparation, or translation

Abstract

A unified query building system generates a source structure comprising nodes from a data structure input of an identified data source, displays the generated source structure in a logical view, adds a selected node or element from the nodes to a design query canvas, generates a query object from the selected node based on a source type of the selected node, presents a logical view of a query function of a selected query object, and generates a unified query comprising the generated query objects. The logical view is displayed in a graphical user interface comprising a design query canvas comprising grids corresponding to functions in a query language such as SQL or XML. The generated unified query is displayed in an actual query view and is outlined in a query outline view.

Claims

1. A processor-implemented method of building a unified query that spans heterogeneous environments using a computer comprising:

identifying a data source location by a user;

causing the computer to generate a source structure comprising a plurality of nodes from a data structure input of an identified data source, wherein the identified data source includes at least one of a plurality of heterogeneous query languages;

causing the computer to present the generated source structure in a logical view, wherein the logical view includes a hierarchical presentation of the identified data source;

adding a node selected by a user from the plurality of nodes to a design query canvas;

causing the computer to generate a query object from the node based on a source type of the selected node;

causing the computer to present a logical view of a query function of a selected query object, wherein the logical view presents a plurality of common query language logical constructs abstracted from the plurality of heterogeneous query languages;

selecting the query function for operation on the node by the user; and

causing the computer to generate the unified query comprising the generated query object, the unified query configured to directly query the identified data source, wherein the unified query includes an embedded expression corresponding with the at least one of the plurality of heterogeneous query languages.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the logical view is displayed in a graphical user interface.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the design query canvas comprises a query design view.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein the design query canvas further comprises having grids for generating a query for an extensible markup language.

5. The method of claim 3, wherein the design query canvas further comprises element and attribute grids for generating a query for an extensible markup language.

6. The method of claim 1, further comprising displaying the generated unified query in an actual query view.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the query object is configurable to comprise a SQl (Structured Query language) object responsive to a SQl data source and is also configurable to comprise an XMl (eXtensible Markup language) object responsive to being based on an XMl data source.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein a unified query is configured to comprise a SQl (Structured Query language) query, a SQUXMl (eXtensible Markup language) query, an XQuery (XMl QUERY language), and an XSlT (eXtensible Stylesheet language Transformations) query.

9. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

adding a second selected node from the plurality of nodes to the design query canvas;

generating a second query objected from the second selected node based on a source type of the second selected node, wherein the unified query comprises the generated query object and the second generated query object.

10. A processor-implemented system of building a unified query that spans heterogeneous environments, comprising:

a data structure input for generating a source structure comprising a plurality of nodes from a data structure input of an identified data source;

a parser for presenting the generated source structure in a logical view, wherein the logical view includes a hierarchical presentation of the identified data source;

user input actions for adding a selected node from the nodes to a design query canvas;

a presentation module for generating a query object from the selected node based on a source type of the selected node;

a display module for presenting a logical view of a query function of a selected query object, wherein the logical view presents a plurality of common query language logical constructs abstracted from the plurality of heterogeneous query languages;

user input actions for selecting the query function for operation on the node; and

a transformer for generating a unified query comprising the generated query object.

11. The system of claim 10, wherein the selected node comprises an element.

12. The system of claim 10, further comprising a graphical user interface for displaying the logical view.

13. The system of claim 10, wherein the design query canvas comprises a query design view.

14. The system of claim 10, wherein the parser includes an XML parser.

15. A computer program product having program codes for building a unified query that spans heterogeneous environments using a computing device, comprising:

a computer usable medium;

a program code for generating a source structure comprising a plurality of nodes from a data structure input of an identified data source;

a program code for presenting the generated source structure in a logical view, wherein the logical view includes a hierarchical presentation of the identified data source;

a program code for adding a selected node from the nodes to a design query canvas;

a program code for generating a query object from the selected node based on a source type of the selected node;

a program code for presenting a logical view of a query function of a selected query object, wherein the logical view presents a plurality of common query language logical constructs abstracted from the plurality of heterogeneous query languages;

a program code for selecting the query function for operation on the node by the user; and

a program code for generating a unified query comprising the generated query object.

16. The computer program product of claim 15, wherein the selected node comprises an element.

17. The computer program product of claim 15, further comprising a graphical user interface for displaying the logical view.

18. The computer program product of claim 15, wherein the design query canvas comprises a query design view.

19. The computer program product of claim 15, wherein the parser includes an XML parser.