Automatic Consistency Assessment for Query Results in Dynamic Environments

Dr. Jamie Payton

UNC-Charlotte, Dept. CS

Friday, October 5th, 2007

3:00 p.m. - 4:00 p.m.

Woodward Hall, Room 106

Complete Description:

Queries are convenient abstractions for the discovery of information and services, as they offer content-based information access. In distributed settings, query semantics are well-defined, e.g., queries are often designed to satisfy the ACID transactional properties. When query processing is introduced in a dynamic network setting, achieving transactional semantics becomes complex due to the open and unpredictable environment. In this talk, I will describe a query processing model for mobile ad hoc and sensor networks that is suitable for expressing a wide range of query semantics; the semantics differ in the degree of consistency with which query results reflect the state of the environment during query execution. I will introduce several distinct notions of consistency and formally express them using this model. I will also present a protocol for query processing that automatically assesses and adaptively provides an achievable degree of consistency given the state of the operational environment throughout its execution. The protocol attaches an assessment of the achieved guarantee to returned query results, allowing precise reasoning about a query with a range of possible semantics. Bio: Dr. Payton is an Assistant Professor of Computer Science at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, where she is a member of the Networking Research Laboratory and the Charlotte Visualization Center. Her research work lies in the areas of software engineering and ubiquitous computing, and is focused on applying software engineering techniques to simplify the design and development of applications designed for use in mobile ad hoc and sensor networks.