On XPath with transitive axes and data tests

Abstract

We study the satisfiability problem for XPath with data equality tests. XPath is a node selecting language for XML documents whose satisfiability problem is known to be undecidable, even for very simple fragments. However, we show that the satisfiability for XPath with the rightward, leftward and downward reflexive-transitive axes (namely following-sibling-or-self, preceding-sibling-or-self, descendant-or-self) is decidable. Our algorithm yields a complexity of 3EXPSPACE, and we also identify an expressive-equivalent normal form for the logic for which the satisfiability problem is in 2EXPSPACE. These results are in contrast with the undecidability of the satisfiability problem as soon as we replace the reflexive-transitive axes with just transitive (non-reflexive) ones.