Designing semistructured databases using ORA-SS model

Semistructured data has become prevalent with the growth of the Internet. The development of new web applications that require efficient design and maintenance of large amounts of data makes it increasingly important to design "good" semistructured databases to prevent data redundancy and updating anomalies. However, it is not easy, even impossible, for current semistructured data models to capture the semantics traditionally needed for designing databases. In this paper, we show how an object-relationship-attribute model for semistructured data (ORA-SS) can facilitate the design of "good" semistructured databases. This is accomplished via the normalization of ORA-SS. An XML DTD or Schema generated from a normal form ORA-SS schema diagram has no undesirable redundancy, and thus no updating anomalies for the complying semistructured databases. The general design methodology and detailed steps for converting an ORA-SS schema diagram into a normal form ORA-SS schema diagram are presented. These steps can also be used as guidelines for designing semistructured databases using the ORA-SS model.