A Generalized Query-by-Example Data Manipulation Language Based on Database Logic

The purpose of this paper is to introduce a Generalized-Query-By-Example (GQBE) data manipulation language (DML) that can be built on top of most existing databases (ie., relational, hierarchical, and network). The data manipulation language supports retrieval, insertion, deletion, and update operations and has a formal semantics based on database logic. It is also seen that GQBE can by used as a DML on external views of an integrated database. We also show the advantages of GQBE on heterogeneous databases over Zloof's QBE on relational external views.