Visual representation of database queries using structural similarity

Abstract

It is often useful to get high-level views of datasets in order to identify areas of interest worthy of further exploration. In relational databases, the high-level view can be described using entity-relationship diagrams, which identify relationships between entities in the data model. Such high-level views are useful for database design activities, and can be used to generate user interfaces for constructing queries. This research introduces techniques for visualizing structural similarity of database queries. We demonstrate that individual queries can be visualized using graph visualization techniques. A distance measure based on query structure is proposed that provides database designers and administrators with a high-level perspective of relationships in the underlying data.